Bungie details, discusses landmark Activision deal

 Source: GamesSpot

This morning, Halo: Reach developer Bungie stunned the gaming world with the announcement that it had signed an exclusive 10-year worldwide publishing and distribution agreement with Activision to handle its first original intellectual property since Halo. The announcement made a few things clear, most notable among them that formerly Microsoft-owned Bungie would be making games on multiple platforms once again.

However, the announcement still left a wealth of questions unanswered. Speaking with GameSpot, Bungie community manager Brian Jarrard and writer and design director Joseph Staten addressed a number of key points, including concerns about Activision in light of the recent drama over Infinity Ward, some specific limitations of the deal, whether Bungie could make games for other publishers, and whether the publisher can have other studios create their own spin-offs in the as-yet unnamed new universe.

THE DEAL
GS: How long has this deal been in the works?

BJ: Bungie has actually been out there for a year straight now working hard, discussing our future with potential partners. But the Activision deal itself began in earnest about nine months ago. That got us through to the end of March when an initial term agreement was signed. And just this week the official formal, long-form contract was signed, and that was the impetus for us making the announcement today. It's officially official.

GS: How many potential publishers did you talk with before committing to go with Activision?

BJ: We pretty much talked to every prospective publisher out there. There's only a handful of publishers who could operate on the magnitude of what we're envisioning for our next project and a deal of this scope, with this unprecedented 10-year range. We got through the discussions and started focusing on things that were really important to us, [like] making sure Bungie still owned the IP. We still wanted to be an independent company and weren't looking to be absorbed or sell an ownership stake in the studio. [We wanted to make] sure we had creative control over our projects and our vision for this universe, and [tried] to find a partner that could bring us the largest possible audience across multiple platforms and devices. At the end of the day, Activision was the one partner where all these factors would align for us.

GS: So you knew you didn't want to go with a platform holder?

BJ: I wouldn't say we 100 percent knew, but it's clear from the beginning our intent as storytellers and people that create universes, we were looking for the largest audience we could get. We're excited by the prospect of having new avenues to reach out to fans, new touch points, new interesting engagements and interactions that wouldn't be limited to a single box.

GS: Activision's main business model calls for annual installments of its biggest franchises. Will Bungie be dramatically increasing its output, or will Activision be able to have other studios develop spin-offs in this universe?

BJ: To the second question, definitely no. Bungie does own this IP, so nothing's going to happen with it that we haven't agreed to. Who knows? Maybe there's some world where there's an interesting extension of the universe that we feel would be best handled by a different group with our oversight and that's a discussion we could certainly have, but that's something that we would drive.

In terms of output, we're not going to get into the details of how many different titles this 10-year period will yield, but we're not being shoehorned into an annual release model that Activision might have for some of its other properties. They partnered with us based on this 10-year plan that we've collectively sat down and walked through. We have dates and real milestones, deliverables that we've both agreed to and believe in. Again, it's about us really shaping and realizing the creative vision we have for this universe, and Activision being the great partner to allow us to do that. That's what they're signing up for.

GOING MULTIPLATFORM
GS: Bungie's expertise is in developing for the Xbox 360, but Activision has already said it would be bringing games to "all platforms." Are you going to get up to speed on everything, or will other studios be helping to port your titles to some of the platforms you're less familiar with?

BJ: I would caveat "all platforms" to mean multiple platforms and devices. "All platforms" may be a little too broad of a comment to make, a little too dangerous. The reality is we're only going to go to platforms and devices that we think actually make sense for the types of experiences we want gamers to have and the interesting ways our universe can be extended onto those devices. I don't think that means every possible device known to man.

As far as development goes, we're going to obviously have some ramping up to do ourselves. We've been working exclusively on the Xbox [platforms] for about a decade now and we know it really well. But in order to get a bigger audience, we are going to have to broaden our horizons. Partially that's going to happen internally. We've grown a lot as a studio and hired a lot of great talent. We have a really deep, seasoned bench of engineering staff. Thankfully one of the other benefits of Activision is that they do have a lot of expertise on a lot of different platforms. They'll have resources and people that will be available to us as well to help us make the right decisions.

GS: The popular narrative is that Bungie left Microsoft because it was tired of making Halo games for 10 straight years and wanted to try something new. If that has any truth to it, why jump right into a deal that will have you making games based on this new IP for 10 straight years?

JS: I think like a lot of popular myths, that one just isn't true. I was the creative director on [Halo 3] ODST, and we wouldn't have done that game if we weren't excited about telling that story. We wouldn't have done Reach if we weren't excited about telling this great new sort of prequel to all the Halo games we made. When you get a chance to play the beta and see the stuff we're announcing at E3 and all the Reach stuff that's going to happen over the summer, I think it's obvious that we at Bungie are passionate and excited about all the games we make.

I think the reason we became an independent company back in 2007 was we wanted to be independent. We wanted to chart our own future. We wanted to own our creations. That was a really important thing to us. And we wanted to reach as broad an audience as possible, and the path forward wasn't as being an internal Microsoft first-party studio. Where we are today is the logical extension of that journey we started on in 2007, and it really had nothing to do with us being tired of Halo, which frankly, we aren't.

GS: Could Bungie still make games using different IP for other publishers?

BJ: I guess it's conceivable that we could have those discussions. But the reality is that the type of project we are building for the next 10 years, the ambition we're aiming for and the types of stories we want to tell, it's really going to take the might of our entire team to do it right. I think Bungie's at its best when we're all united with a single vision and all of our best talent is working together on the same project. So that's certainly our plan right now.

ACTIVISION CONCERNS?
GS: I'm sure a lot of Bungie fans are probably a bit nervous about this announcement given what's happened between Activision and Infinity Ward lately. As the community manager, Brian, how are you reassuring your fans that this deal won't wind up being a bad thing?

BJ: Ultimately there's only so much we can say. At the end of the day, I would definitely tell our fans to hang in there and eventually the game will speak for itself. Many people said the same thing 10 years ago when Microsoft acquired Bungie that, "That was it. That was the end of Bungie." I think we actually weathered that pretty well and are even better because of it. In this new partnership we're going into, we actually have even more freedom and creative control and ability to do what Bungie does best. And that's make awesome games and engaging universes and compelling stories. We're better poised now to do more than we've ever been able to do before.

People will probably continue to be skeptical based on things they've read online, but clearly we would not have signed a deal that we felt was in any way not in our best interests: Making sure that we own our own IP, that we have the creative control to drive the decision-making process for our own creative vision, and that we're still fully independent. That should put a lot of people at ease right away if they stop to think about what that means.

THE NEW IP
GS: It sounds like the scope of this new IP is pretty grand. How long has the idea for this new IP been kicking around? Is it something that you've been fleshing out and turning over in your heads for years and years, or is it a more recent creation?

JS: Well, [Bungie co-founder and creative director] Jason Jones has been thinking about the next project he'd like to work on for a number of years now. As early as 2007, he got a core team of people together--a very, very small team--and has been cooking up different ideas. But it's only been in the last year or so that those ideas have crystallized to the point that we can take them out to different publishers and really shop those ideas around. It's safe to say we're really in "preproduction" mode right now. We've got really good plans, we know our path for the next 10 years. We're looking at the dates that are coming up earliest and we're aligning everybody around the first stories we really want to tell.

As soon as the team rolls off of Reach--and the vast majority of people at Bungie are working on Reach--the core team of which I'm a part really needs to be ready for everybody to join us. So we're absolutely making real plans and making real progress.

GS: Joseph, in terms of writing, what do you see as the key characteristics that would be in any new game the studio makes? What makes a Bungie game a Bungie game?

JS: I'd like to think we create universes where we tell lots of different stories that appeal to lots of different people. We're a company that doesn't just think about a single game and moving on to the next one. We try to take a long view, and that's a process we've developed over the last 10 years.

To be completely honest, when we were writing the first Halo game for the Xbox 1 launch, we had no idea there was going to be a Halo: Reach, or ODST or Halo 3 or Halo 2. We didn't have that long view. So as someone who's in charge of story and writing at Bungie, it's a tremendous luxury but also a very daunting challenge to be able to sit down today and really map out the specific stories we might want to tell five years from now, seven years from now, eight years from now. But that's what I'm doing right now, and that's really wonderful. It's absolutely a different process, but it's so much better than the way we started working 10 years ago when we were young and not quite as experienced.

GS: Well that way seemed to work out pretty well for you.

INDIE DEVELOPERS, MEGAPUBLISHERS
JS: There were ups and downs for sure, and Bungie emerged in 2007 with a lot of good scars. We learned a lot of hard lessons and continued to do them, but it's really terrific to be able to look around the office and see the same guys that were there 10 years ago working on Halo. We're all still here, but even better, we've still got fire in our bellies and ample creative ideas to take us 10 years and beyond. It's an extremely exciting time to be a part of Bungie.

GS: In recent years, Bungie, the Infinity Ward guys, and Will Wright have all left massive corporate entities to flex their own creative muscle and immediately resigned deals with massive corporate entities that were more favorable. Are these unique cases, or do you think creators are getting more control in the industry across the board?

JS: Without sounding too high and mighty, there aren't many studios that could get a deal like the deal that we got. You talk about Bungie, you talk about Will Wright…We worked very hard for it, don't get me wrong, but we feel extremely fortunate that we're in this position to have the deal we do. Any creative person, any game development studio would of course want to own their own creative ideas and be as independent as possible. But the nature of the business is such that when you're working on a universe like the one we're planning--that's so broad in scope and has so many opportunities for great stories--you kind of need to sign with someone that knows how to handle that in the marketplace. Activision is the world's biggest publisher for a reason. They have a tremendous amount of expertise and marketing know-how and really can help us reach a broad audience. We certainly needed a partner to help us realize this vision, and Activision is a great partner.

BJ: Somebody asked me earlier why we wouldn't just self-publish, but that's not the business we're in. That's not the core competency of our studio. The minute we start having to divert resources and energy to thinking about how we get a box on a shelf in Europe, that's no longer Bungie. There's always going to be a need for some sort of umbrella for creative people to do what they do best and not have to worry about the business aspects of taking that great game and getting an audience for it.

GS: When can gamers expect to have the wraps taken off this new project?

BJ: Well they shouldn't hold their breath.

JS: They should play the Reach beta!

BJ: Clearly it's important to us, and the reason we wanted to hurry and make this announcement after the deal was signed was to get it out of the way. We're excited about it and it's out there now, but we want to focus on Reach. We still have a ways to go until launch. The beta starts on Monday. We don't want to distract or overshadow any of the great work that's being done on Reach. That's going to be our priority for the rest of the year. We'll definitely look forward to sharing more information, but it's going to be a little while. Reach is our focus right now.

Infinity Ward to close, expects analyst

Source: GameSpot

Earlier this month, Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter weighed in on the departure of about a dozen employees from Activision's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 developer, Infinity Ward. He said the studio could lose 20 more and the publisher would just replace them and still put out a competitive product. One of Pachter's colleagues today expressed a more dire appraisal of the situation.

 In a note to investors, Janco Partners analyst Mike Hickey said the Infinity Ward departures "have created meaningful uncertainty around the future of their Call of Duty: Modern Warfare franchise," not to mention the studio itself. Hickey expects that Activision will shutter the studio entirely after the next map pack add-on for Modern Warfare 2 is released.

As for the follow-up, Hickey said development on Modern Warfare 3 would be split between two studios "not historically tied to the franchise." When that game does arrive, Hickey doesn't think it will quite live up to the blockbuster sales of its predecessor. He is expecting a fourth-quarter 2011 release of the game to bring in $738 million by the year's end, where Modern Warfare 2's sales total for roughly the same period was about $1 billion.

Infinity Ward has been the center of turmoil within Activision since last month, when the publisher fired studio cofounders Jason West and Vince Zampella. They sued the company, which sued back, alleging that the pair had been plotting to start a new studio with chief Activision rival Electronic Arts. Within weeks of their termination, West and Zampella started a new studio with chief Activision rival Electronic Arts. A number of Infinity Ward developers jumped ship to join the new studio, dubbed Respawn Entertainment, while others simply resigned. This week, a group of 38 former and current Infinity Ward developers sued Activision for as much as $625 million, alleging the publisher had been withholding royalty and bonus payments due them.

Halo 2 holdouts still playing online MP

Deserved or not, many gamers like to label themselves as being "hardcore." Few could dispute that label applies to the Halo 2 players who,  two weeks after Microsoft pulled the plug on the original Xbox Live, are still playing the sci-fi shooter.

According to a post on the official Bungie forums, the dozen players have not turned off their original Xboxes since Microsoft's official shutdown deadline on April 14. While the game giant extended that deadline to the following day, it apparently cannot kick off the original Halo 2 players as long as they remain online and in a custom game.

Halo 2 holdout Joe Campbell summed it up thusly: "Throughout the past week, a small group of dedicated Halo 2 players kept their Xbox's on so that they could enjoy the game for a while longer. (As long as we don't turn off our Xbox's, or lose connection, we can stay online. Our Xbox's have been on for nearly 14 days straight!) Each day the amount of people decreased, at a rapid rate."

As of 11:46 a.m. PDT on April 28, 12 players remained online: Agent Windex, APACHE N4SIR, sherlok 1 Rob2D, z0mbie stench, Lord Odysseus11, xxMAKDADYxx, H2o Shoagie, xxBooker Dxx, DirtyCajun, AForeignObject, and HiredN00bs.

Infinity Ward employees sue Activision for $150 million-$625 million

 GameSpot

Group of 38 developers allege publisher withheld $75 million-$125 million in royalties, bonuses, and stock options related to Modern Warfare 2 sales and technology during Q1 2010; massive punitive payout also sought; Activision says case "without merit."

Following Activision's dismissal of Infinity Ward founders Jason West and Vince Zampella in March, the two executives responded with a $36 million lawsuit. Weeks later, Activision responded in kind, filing a countersuit accusing the two developers of being "self-serving schemers" trying to set up a new studio with the help of an unnamed Northern California publisher.

Now, two weeks after West and Zampella announced the formation of independent studio Respawn Entertainment with seed money from Electronic Arts, a third lawsuit has been filed by members of the Infinity Ward rank-and-file. The legal action, which has been obtained by GameSpot, shows 38 members of the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 team are now suing Activision, accusing the publisher of "breach of contract," "breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing," "unjust enrichment," and "violation of the California labor code."

Specifically, the 38 current and former Infinity Ward staffers are claiming the publisher only paid out $28 million of a $118 million bonus pool it had accumulated during the fourth quarter of last year. Excluding the share of that pool that was to be paid West and Zampella, the suit says the employees are entitled to at least $82 million. It also claims that Activision has withheld $40 million to $55 million in fourth-quarter Modern Warfare 2 royalties it was due to pay out to ensure delivery of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.

As of January 13, Modern Warfare 2 had grossed over $1.1 billion worldwide and is on record as being the biggest entertainment launch in history. The suit contends that Activision made a profit of at least $900 million off the game by the end of last year.

Overall, the group of 38 wants $75 million to $125 million in compensatory damages for unpaid royalties, bonuses, stock options, and technology-related payments it claims Activision withheld. It is also seeking punitive damages of between $75 million and $500 million as a result of Activision's withholding of the bonuses, which the suit says was tantamount to holding "employees hostage so that Activision could reap the benefit of the completion of Modern Warfare 3."

However, the legal filing contends that the publisher violated California state labor law by not paying out bonuses and any other owed monies within 72 hours of the termination of their employment. Since West and Zampella's dismissal, at least 26 Infinity Ward staffers have left the Encino, California-based studio. Among the employees named in the suit who have since jumped ship to Respawn are lead designer Todd Alderman, lead software engineer Francesco Gigliotti, lead environment artist Chris Cherubini, lead animator John Paul Messerly, lead animator Mark Grigsby, senior software engineer Chris Lambert, senior level designer Jason McCord, senior artist Ryan Lastimosa, and game designer Brent McLeod.

Representatives of an external PR company employed by Activision quickly rebutted the allegations in the new lawsuit. "Activision believes the action is without merit," said the rep. "Activision retains the discretion to determine the amount and the schedule of bonus payments for MW2 and has acted consistent with its rights and the law at all times. We look forward to getting judicial confirmation that our position is right."

Shippin' Out April 25-May 1: Super Street Fighter IV, 2010 FIFA World Cup

source: gamespot
Capcom's latest brawler, EA's soccer sim face off against Dead to Rights: Retribution, Nier, PC Splinter Cell: Conviction, White DSi bundle.

Last week, Capcom launched its latest Monster Hunter game exclusively on the Wii. The publisher is once again the center of attention in stores this week, as it releases Super Street Fighter IV for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. However, unlike last week, there's plenty of competition for consumer dollars on the new release shelves.

Super Street Fighter IV sports 10 new fighters, new levels, and an overhauled online matchmaking system, but it will face stiff competition, starting with EA's 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa. Set for release on the Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, and PSP, the game arrives more than a month ahead of the international tournament's proper start, and features 199 teams and 10 licensed stadiums.

More action-oriented gamers might be interested in Dead to Rights: Retribution. The first new installment in the Namco Bandai canine-assisted cop series since 2005, Retribution has players reprising the role of Jack Slate in a noir-ish romp through the mean streets of Grant City.

Those are far from the only new options for gamers this week. On Sunday, Nintendo launches its newest hardware bundle, a white DSi system with Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story packed in. That will be followed by a pair of localized Japanese offerings for the PS3 and Xbox 360, as Aksys Games recounts the Record of Agarest War and Square Enix hopes the action-adventure Nier goes far on the sales charts.

As for downloadable goodies, Dante's Inferno gets a new add-on in the form of The Trials of St. Lucia, Serious Sam HD: The Second Encounter arrives for the Xbox 360 and PC, and Tecmo Bowl: Throwback kicks off on PS3 and Xbox 360.

New Releases page. The full list of downloadable games on the PlayStation Store, Xbox Live Marketplace, and Wii Shop Channel will be revealed later in the week. Release dates are based on retailer listings and are subject to change.

April 26, 2010
White DSi bundle with Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story

April 26, 2010
Harvest Moon: Hero of Leaf Valley--PSP--Natsume
Vampireville--PC--ValuSoft
The Whispered World--PC--Viva Media

April 27, 2010
2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa--X360, PS3, Wii, PSP--EA Sports
Record of Agarest War--X360, PS3--Aksys Games
Dead to Rights: Retribution--X360, PS3--Namco Bandai Games America
Super Street Fighter IV--X360, PS3--Capcom
Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Conviction--PC--Ubisoft
NIER--PS3, X360--Square Enix
Horrible Histories: Ruthless Romans--WII, PC--Graffiti Entertainment
Free Running--WII--Graffiti Entertainment

April 28, 2010
Serious Sam HD: The Second Encounter--X360, PC--Devolver Digital
Tecmo Bowl Throwback--X360--Tecmo

April 29, 2010
Tecmo Bowl Throwback--PS3--Tecmo Dante's Inferno: Trials of St. Lucia--PS3, X360--Electronic Arts
Kick-Ass--PS3--WHA Entertainment
Lead and Gold: Gangs of the Wild West--PS3--Paradox Interactive

Metroid: Other M, Sin & Punishment 2 delayed

With the sheer number of release dates Nintendo announced at its February media event in San Francisco, the odds were good that one or two of them would change. The publisher today confirmed that a pair of those titles has been delayed, and unfortunately for gamers, it's two of the most anticipated titles on the Wii release slate: Metroid: Other M and Sin & Punishment: Star Successor.

The Team Ninja-developed Metroid: Other M had been set for June 27, but Nintendo has pushed that date back to August 31. The first original Metroid title to be developed for the Wii, Other M is a sort of amalgamation of the sci-fi action series. The game takes place in 3D, like the Metroid Prime trilogy, but scraps those games' first-person perspective in favor of a third-person view more along the lines of the original NES and Super Nintendo Metroid games.

The June 27 release slot won't be left open, as Sin & Punishment: Star Successor is taking that date, sliding back a few weeks from its previously expected June 7 launch. A sci-fi shooter of a different stripe, Star Successor sees twitch gaming developer Treasure revisit its original Nintendo 64 game from 2000, which didn't see release outside of Japan until Nintendo added it to the Wii's Virtual Console catalog in 2007. Like the original game, Star Successor is an on-rails shooter with cooperative play and an emphasis on massive bosses.

Nintendo also doled out release dates for a handful of downloadable WiiWare and DSiWare titles today. The camera-compatible fighting game PhotoDojo was confirmed for May 10, with Nintendo offering the game for free for its first month. Starting June 11, gamers will be able to download it for 200 DSi points ($2). A full list of the downloadable release dates follows below.

Super Street Fighter IV

Updates are a Street Fighter tradition. Capcom always expands each game in the series by adding new characters, balancing the roster, and tweaking the gameplay. This pursuit for perfection can be slow, and the changes may go unnoticed, but the effort eventually pays off. Series' favorites Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo and Street Fighter 3: Third Strike are a direct result of work completed over multiple iterations. And with Super Street Fighter 4, Capcom continues this tradition, aiming to make it more than a slight upgrade.





T. Hawk, a grappler, is surprisingly quick. His movement is a lot faster than the game's other grapplers, such as Zangief, and that's a help in setting up his Typhoon, a powerful throw performed with a 360 motion and a punch. Depending on the punch's strength, a Typhoon sets the opponent on knockdown in different ranges. A weak punch places an opponent in the sweet spot for a cross-up or a throw upon wakeup, while the strong punch sends them flying across the stage. Another notable tweak is the combination Tomahawk Buster, an uppercut special attack, and the midair Condor Dive. Against opponents who love to jump in, T. Hawk players can harshly punish them with a Tomahawk Buster followed by an EX Condor Dive for additional damage. A new move, the Condor Spire, lets T. Hawk travel above the ground momentarily. It looks fairly ordinary, but its effects are quite handy. And because T. Hawk is briefly airborne during it, he can safely avoid opponent low attacks. The Condor Spire also pushes him forward, so T. Hawk players can use it to get into the opponent's immediate space and threaten them with the damaging Typhoon.

Juri is a Korean Taekwondo fighter whose moves emphasize the power and range of her kicks, performed mainly with a quarter motion command and a kick button. She's agile and quick, but with low stamina. Her special attacks include a quick flip kick that's safe on blocking, a dive kick performed at the top of her jump, and purple fireballs from her feet. Depending on the strength of the kick input, the fireballs travel at different angles: some at 45 degrees towards the air, or going parallel across the stage. The fireballs offer an interesting strategic quality, allowing players to "store" them by holding down the kick button, releasing it at a later time, not unlike Gilgamesh' stored projectiles in Capcom's Fate/Unlimited codes. The strategic possibilities are fascinating; you can store all three versions (Low kick, Medium kick, Hard kick), and release the fireballs in sequence or all at once.

Capcom's goals for SSF4 are ambitious. Less than a year after Street Fighter 4's console release, the company plans to release a substantial update sometime in Spring 2010, incorporating more characters, more gameplay enhancements, and more online matchmaking options. While some tweaks are hard to spot (such as faster Focus Attacks for all characters), the new characters are considerable additions to the game. SSF4 is still early in its development phase, but there's no doubt the next few months could be very exciting for SF4 fans.


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The Whispered World

Preview:

These days, point-and-click adventure games have become about as common as a sad clown. But point-and-click adventure games about sad clowns? Well, those are among the rarest of them all--yet that’s precisely what The Whispered World is all about. This adventure title from German developer Daedalic Entertainment stars a depressed clown named Sadwick who’s been tormented by mysterious nightmares. Here at GamesCom in Cologne, we just had the chance to see this strangely charming game courtesy of Daedalic.

The Whispered World is an old-fashioned adventure game through and through. It features hand-drawn 2D visuals and a simple control scheme where the player simply points at an object and chooses to look at it, interact with it, or pick it up and keep it depending on the situation. The 2D visuals are especially notable because they’re nothing short of gorgeous. All the backgrounds are vibrant, colorful hand-drawn artwork that spans everything from dank caves to bright autumn forests. Cutscenes are fully animated cartoon sequences that fill in the gaps of the story, and there are a lot of them, too--something on the order of 50 minutes worth of animation throughout the course of the entire game.

Sadwick belongs to a family of clowns living in a caravan in the forest. His brother is a bit of a jerk, but his grandfather is a kind old man who has gone a bit senile and started cooking all their meals with disgusting ingredients. But that’s not what’s getting at Sadwick; it’s the fact that he’s having terrible nightmares every night. Eventually, he meets with an oracle who tells him what those dreams mean: Sadwick will be the very person responsible for the end of the world, which is going to be happening very soon. Naturally, Sadwick doesn’t want that sort of notoriety weighing on his shoulders, so he sets off on a quest to the kingdom at the center of the world to find out how to stop himself from becoming a walking, chronically depressed apocalypse.

That journey is aided by Sidewick’s pet blob, Spot. This little guy is an amorphous green ball of happy-go-lucky goo that can shape-shift into various forms in order to help Sidewick solve puzzles throughout the game. He can fill himself with water to become a heavy orb, flatten himself out like a sheet of paper, turn into flaming torch, and so on. The rest of the gameplay appears to be typical adventure fare, requiring players to examine every suspicious object they find in the game to see if it has some hidden function, reacts to an object in their inventory, or just provides the protagonist with the opportunity to drop a witty remark. For example, when Sadwick examines the bear rug in his room, it gives him the opportunity to remind himself that no matter how bad life gets, it could be worse--you could always end up as a decoration on the floor of a sad clown’s bedroom.

The Whispered World is due to be released very soon in Daedalic’s home country of Germany. The demo we saw was entirely in German but with English subtitles accompanying all the dialogue--which was quite witty and cleverly written. Right now, the team is working on translating the entire game and getting English voice acting in there as well. It should be out in English-speaking markets on the PC sometime next year.

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Splinter Cell: Conviction

Splinter Cell: Conviction Review

Sam Fisher is back, and he is not in a good mood. Of all the smart decisions made in crafting a new Splinter Cell title, this might be the best one developer Ubisoft Montreal made. Sam's angry and you hear it in every grunted line of dialogue, can see it in the brutal takedowns and interrogation moves and feel it pulsating through Sam with every step. That anger, that aggressiveness is built not only into the story but the gameplay changes as well. It was a huge risk deviating from the trial-and-error style that made the series famous, but it paid off. Splinter Cell Conviction is awesome.

The story takes place a few years after the end of Splinter Cell: Double Agent. Don't worry, if you never finished that game, you'll get caught up quickly as to what's going on. Sam's daughter was killed, he murdered his best friend Lambert, and he split from Third Echelon, the government agency he'd called home for years. With new evidence leading to his daughter's killer, a tormented and semi-retired Sam Fisher is called back into action. Turns out the people responsible for his daughter's fate are planning a major terrorist attack on Washington D.C. This is going to be one long day for Jack Bauer Sam Fisher.

Conviction sets itself apart from its predecessors with its pacing. You're always being pushed forward, so much so that I played through the entire single-player campaign in one sitting without even realizing I'd been up all night. Ubisoft pulled off a few magic tricks to make this happen.

There are no in-game loading screens unless you die. From the moment the game starts, you never sit around waiting for something to happen. Levels are loaded while you're watching slickly presented cutscenes. Fancy new projection technology integrates text into the scenery to point you towards your goal, and back story is shown with movies playing out on walls as you progress through a level. These things aid in keeping players immersed in the world, but the real reason things feel so fluid is the change in approach to stealth.

In Conviction, stealth is about speed.

Sam moves fast. Really fast. He can get in and out of cover quickly, shimmy across ledges faster than the Prince of Persia and beat a hasty retreat if he gets into trouble. Sam's codename used by Third Echelon is "panther," and that's fitting. In past Splinter Cell games, enemies were meant to be avoided; in Conviction, Sam is a hunter. He isn't avoiding enemies, he's stalking them.

Sam lurks in the shadows, finds his moment to pounce and strikes with deadly efficiency. There may be a dozen men, fully armed and with extensive combat training closing in, but they're the ones who should be worried. You feel like the ultimate badass thanks to some generous aiming assists that let you easily put bullets into approaching enemy noggins.

Rather than force players to eyeball a variety of meters to determine their level of stealth, Ubisoft made things very obvious. If you're in the shadows and impossible to see, the color bleeds out and things go black and white. The minute you're in the light, the color comes back. This easy sense of whether you are hidden or exposed enables you to move quickly through the environment and plan your route of attack on the fly.

Shadows and light are just half the stealth equation. The other half is the cover system. The cover is not at all like Gears of War, where you're sucked against a wall. Squeeze the left trigger and if you are near an object, you'll take cover behind it. Release the trigger and you immediately disengage, or you can hold down the trigger and move away from cover with no problem. You're never attached to a surface. In fact, you can hold down the trigger when out in the open and Sam will crouch, doing his best to minimize his visibility.

This is the best cover system I've ever used. Every other game needs to change, because I can't go back.

Should you be spotted, the best thing to do is retreat. Get out of sight and a white silhouette appears, marking your Last Known Position. The AI will focus on this spot, because it's where they think you're hiding. They'll unload some shots, maybe toss a grenade and then make their way towards the spot to see if they got you. On Realistic difficulty -- the only way you should play Conviction -- the AI is very sharp and won't be fooled for long. You can use the Last Known Position to your advantage. Flank your enemies when their attention is on your silhouette, then take them out before they realize what's going on.

Using shadows and cover, you stalk your prey, and when you're close enough, you can perform a hand-to-hand takedown. There are dozens (probably more than a hundred) of these. They're an excellent reward for being sneaky. My favorite is shooting a guy in the leg and as he crumples downward, popping him in the chin with my silenced pistol. But the system isn't perfect. You bash in a door with the same button as a hand-to-hand takedown. Attempt to quietly kill an enemy near a door and you may end up kicking in the door and causing a ruckus. Occasional glitches aside, stealth kills look cool, avoid attracting attention and earn you the ability to execute.

The Mark & Execute system is probably the most controversial change to the Splinter Cell series. You can tag or "mark" enemies, putting a big arrow over their heads and then executing them with the press of a button. So long as the mark is red, you are guaranteed a kill. As it's described, this would seem like a "win" button that would make Splinter Cell too easy. Far from it. You have to work to earn the right to execute. Use it once and you must perform another stealth takedown to activate the execution option again. More importantly, executing does not equal "stealthily execute." If you aren't careful, you can easily expose yourself to enemies when you enter execution mode. There are often more enemies than you could ever mark, so it's not as if you run through tagging and killing with ease.

Each weapon has its own unique properties, including the number of available marks. This is a great way to balance the game while adding a bit of strategy to how you gear up before heading into action. Do you take the low-powered Five-Seven pistol because it has the most marks (four) or do you up your firepower to another gun, sacrificing the marks?

Mark & Execute is a great addition and doesn't ruin Splinter Cell in any way. The only drawback is that sometimes you'll hit Execute and a targeted enemy will pass behind a wall. You'll still score the kill, but your bullet with defy physics and phase through the obstruction to hit your target.

All of these new gameplay elements are quickly explained in the single-player campaign. These things are so intuitive, that the tutorial is over before you know it. The campaign is a brisk and enjoyable five-hour experience that has only two odd spots.

Early on, there is a flashback to 20 years ago in Iraq. Out in broad daylight, all stealth is eliminated and Splinter Cell becomes nothing more than a third-person shooter. The other section that sticks out is an area where, if spotted, you fail the mission. What a bad idea. This is what Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory fixed five years ago. Who wants instant-fail gameplay?

While the single-player campaign won't take long to beat, even on Realistic difficulty, it's just one piece of the larger package. There's a ton of content in Conviction: a totally separate co-op campaign, Hunter, Infiltration, and Last Stand modes. Plus, there's an an in-game challenge system to test your stealth skills.

The co-op is well worth discussing. It is, after all, better than the single-player campaign. Offering split-screen, System Link and online support, you and a friend take on the roles of Third Echelon agent Archer and Russian Voron agent Ketrel. The co-op story is a prequel to the single-player campaign and has the two teaming up to hunt down some missing WMDs. While both Archer and Kestrel have the same moves as Sam, they must work together to make it through four unique environments.

Live together or die alone. That's the motto for Splinter Cell's co-op. If your friend dies, the mission fails. That means you must watch each other's back. Fortunately, you can heal your fallen friend before he bleeds out. And if your pal is careless and gets grabbed by an enemy, he can elbow his captor's face to gain a bit of separation before you cap him.

The ultimate joy of co-op is marking and executing enemies in tandem. Archer and Kestrel share their marks. So even if your buddy marks someone, if you have the angle, you can hit the execute button to take them down. When you both have line-of-sight on marked enemies, time slows down for a few seconds after an execution move begins. If your friend taps the execute button, he can join in. This often leads to double-shots to a villain's dome.

NIER

Preview:

When Nier was first announced last year, there was some confusion over what it actually was. Early reports called it an action game in the vein of God of War, and that impression seems to have become ingrained as time has gone on. Square Enix has been trying to change that though, and it's started the process by showing me a demo with as many RPG elements as possible. I was left with the firm realization that, yes, Nier is indeed an action-RPG. The remaining question is whether or not it'll end up being a good one.

The story begins in a grim, post-apocalyptic world in which the majority of humanity has been infected by a nasty plague. The intended cure ends up making the disease even worse, and the result is a virus that turns its victims into creatures called Shades. After a brief glimpse of the character Nier and his daughter -- who has been infected with the virus -- we're thrown ahead more than 300 years, only to find that not much has changed. Nier's daughter is somehow not only still alive, but still sick with the virus. At that point, the game begins in earnest.

At least part of the story is set in what appears to be a medieval village that serves as a hub for a variety of missions. The mission that I saw was a fairly simple fetch quest that required Nier to go out into the country and kill some sheep. Not the most inspired quest, but there will apparently be longer quest chains as well. The reward for completing these missions will be items that can be used to craft new weapons, and special words like "Gebi Solir" that add new spells and abilities.

These words are significant, because Nier gets his power from a special book that hovers at his side at all times. The Grimoire Weiss, as it is called, not only lends its powers to a variety of attacks, but it has a bit of an attitude. This book adds some intrigue to the story, since it's not entirely clear where Nier got it. We only know that it's dangerous because he won't let his daughter anywhere near it.

The demo ended with a battle against a giant Shade that attempts to destroy the game's hub village. The ensuing fight brings to mind the giant Heartless from Kingdom Hearts, which destroys the Destiny Islands from the first game. In that game as in this one, there isn't much more to the battle than to slash at the creature's ankles with a variety of attacks and try to bring it down.

Actually, the fighting in general is reminiscent of Kingdom Hearts. Less involved than God of War or other pure action games, defeating Shades is a matter of hacking, slashing and using a variety of magic attacks. The battle mechanics are perhaps a hair more involved than Kingdom Hearts, as the variety of attacks is somewhat wide, but it still leans much more toward "RPG" than "action game."

In the end, a lot of what I've seen suggests that Square-Enix is trying to give Nier some of ever-elusive crossover appeal by featuring a more mature protagonist, and a more action-oriented approach. Hopefully someone at Square-Enix will realize that achieving such success is about more than superficial elements -- there needs to be some depth as well. The version that I saw was quite early though, so there's plenty of time to polish things up. We'll see how the developers do when Nier hits later this year.


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Dead to Rights: Retribution

Publisher: Namco
Developer: Volatile Games
Release Date: Apr 27, 2010
Platforms: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360
GT Game Rank: 33 of 8,873
Users Tracking: 289

Tear crime syndicates a new one as Jack Slate in Dead to Rights: Retribution.

Video Games | Dead to Rights: Retribution | Preview

XBox 360 | Playstation 3 | Nintendo Wii

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2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa

2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa

Preview: Source: http://www.gamespot.com/

2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa Q&A

Producer Matt Prior takes us through some of the new features in EA Sports' upcoming World Cup game.

With the Super Bowl finished up, and March Madness about to wrap up, the attention of the world's sports fans will soon shift to the World Cup this summer in South Africa. Thirty-two teams will face off for the ultimate in bragging rights when the tournament kicks off in June. If you can't wait that long, you'll be able to get a taste of what to expect with the upcoming 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa from EA Sports. The game is coming for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, and PSP in April, and recently we got a chance to speak with the game's producer, Matt Prior, to learn about some of the newly announced features in the game.


Matt Prior: We have partnered with Coca-Cola Zero for an ambitious feature called the Coca-Cola Zero Story of the Finals. We will re-create moments from the real World Cup during the actual tournament and will allow gamers to play them out in the game. From June 11 to July 11, as the actual World Cup is taking place in South Africa, we will select the most interesting match scenarios each day, and gamers will be able to download them for free and play them out in the game. For example, if in the real World Cup England were losing to the US with 10 minutes to go but ended up winning with two late Rooney goals, we would re-create that scenario and allow gamers to download it. It may take the form of a scenario where the gamer plays as Rooney and joins the game in the 80th minute in an attempt to re-create Rooney's real-life heroics or alternatively we may choose to let the gamer take control of the US team and try and prevent the loss. 

GS: Describe the process of how the team will create these scenarios. How quickly will scenarios be available during the World Cup? How many scenarios will you be creating? 

MP: As diehard football fans, we will all be watching every single game during the World Cup. While watching, we'll be taking note of the most exciting games and key incidents, and at the end of each day we'll sit down and decide which ones we want to create. The scenarios will go live within 24 hours after the actual games take place. We need testing time for each, so we can't get them out any sooner than that unfortunately.

We are aiming to do a scenario for every game, but nothing has been finalized yet. I think it will be a very popular feature as it directly connects our game to the real World Cup on a daily basis, which is something we have never done before. For those disgruntled fans whose teams don't do too well, it also gives them the opportunity to vent frustration by downloading the game and showing them how things should have happened. 

GS: Beyond the obvious of downloading new scenarios, will there be any online component to Story of the Finals mode, such as leaderboards? 

MP: Not this time. If it proves popular, it's certainly something we could look at in the future, but I think for a first-time outing it will be enough for gamers just to have the ability to play alongside the actual tournament taking place on their TV. 

GS: What scenarios will be part of the Story of Qualifying mode? 

MP: There are lots, as the actual qualifying process created a lot of interesting opportunities. We actually had a tough time picking them as there were so many we could have done. I don't want to spoil the surprise completely, but there are over 50 to choose from, and they include scenarios from all of the different confederations. One of the great things about this mode is that it allows gamers to play with teams that they may not ordinarily pick, so they'll get to see all the different environments and stadiums in the game. Some of the more memorable ones we have included are Argentina's visit to Bolivia and having to deal with the issues of playing at high altitude; the historic playoff between bitter rivals Egypt and Algeria (the first time in the history of the World Cup a playoff of that kind has happened); the USA's visit to the Azteca in Mexico in a must-win scenario for the home side; and who can forget the game between France and Ireland in Paris and the now infamous Thierry Henry handball incident.

As an added bonus, completing each of the scenarios earns points which go towards unlocking the extra scenarios. The unlockable bonus scenarios are all from the 2006 FIFA World Cup Germany, and we all know how memorable that was. Remember the incident in the final!

GS: Elsewhere in the game, we've seen the composure meter that will be used with penalty kicks. What kind of fan feedback have you seen on this feature? Have there been any tweaks to the system based on this feedback? 

MP: There was a lot of feedback and tweaks required on the new penalty kick system, as it is such a step forward to what gamers are used to. We actually ended up putting in a training mode, as we were finding gamers were missing almost every kick because they were not used to the added accuracy and control of the new system. The composure meter was all part of that tuning and feedback and is one of the features that help us emphasize the pressure of taking a penalty kick. Each player has a different composure setting in the database, and in addition to that, the composure meter will also be affected depending upon the importance of the kick. If it's simply a kick to extend a big lead in a friendly match, then there is not much pressure. If it's the kick to win the World Cup, that's an entirely different matter, and the composure meter will relay that to the user. The feedback on the new system has been hugely positive so far. 

GS: What new features in FIFA 2010 will we recognize once FIFA 11 is released later this year? 

MP: We have a central gameplay team that continually refines and improves the gameplay experience for all of our football titles. It's all part of continuing the evolution of the EA football games so they get better and better with each iteration. The gameplay improvements in World Cup will certainly feature in FIFA, as they make the game that much better. FIFA 2010 World Cup South Africa represent the best football game EA has ever produced, so we are not going to throw all of that effort away. Likewise, we put a lot of effort into the new penalty kick system, so we will consider carrying this over as well. In terms of modes, there are clearly a lot in World Cup that relate to just the World Cup, so they won't feature, but everything we do to improve the gameplay experience will be carried over. 

GS: Tell us about Captain Your Country mode. 

MP: Captain Your Country is a mode based around achieving the ultimate goal of any professional footballer and that is captaining your nation to World Cup glory and being the one who lifts the trophy at the end of it all. You play as an individual player, which creates a unique spin on gameplay. You can play as one of the real-world players, create a new player, or even bring your virtual pro in from FIFA. If you choose to create a player or bring in your virtual pro, you also have the added bonus of being able to grow your player. As you play well and move up the rankings from B team player all the way to the first team squad, your player's attributes will improve. Most of the producers chose to create a player, as we have also added thousands of new commentary names that you can assign. There is nothing quite like hearing the commentator shout your name as you score, so the created players make it that much more special. The mode is a local multiplayer mode for up to four players, and that also creates a unique spin on gameplay. As a team, you are all competing for the same prize: to take your team through the entire qualifying campaign and onto World Cup glory. The subplot, however, is that you are all competing on an individual level for the captaincy, so while you must all play as a team, the other players are your direct rivals for the ultimate prize. These competing goals create some very interesting and entertaining games and a very different gameplay experience than many will be used to. 

GS: Players can use either existing stars or created players in Captain Your Country mode. We've seen this option in Be a Pro modes in other games, but I'm wondering if you have any data that shows how often people use one or the other? 

MP: We do track data surrounding these things, as it helps us develop features that gamers want and ensures we focus our efforts in the areas most people use. Making created players has become more popular since we have put more features surrounding it. In FIFA 10, there were 2.8 million virtual pros created, and 770,000 of these players utilized the photo game face feature through easportsfootballworld.com.

You will always get users who want to play as their heroes, and that's perfectly fine, but using a created player has its own unique personal feel in my opinion. In Captain Your Country on World Cup, for example, we have added another 6,000 player names that users can assign to their player. If you are lucky enough to have a name that features in that long list (and most people probably will), then you can give your created player your own name and hear the commentator shout it as you score. You'll also see your name feature in news headlines in the Fifa.com screen we have incorporated in the game. It's just a couple of the things that makes using a created player that much more satisfying. Additionally, using a created player also allows you to grow his attributes, which is something you can't do with an existing player, so he'll develop as the game progresses.

We'll always support both, but as we continue to develop the created player and make the process much more user-friendly, with features like game face and so on, I think you'll likely find more and more people gravitating towards creating themselves. In Captain Your Country, if you are good enough, you get to see yourself lift the World Cup surrounded by the real-world team. How cool is that!


2010 FIFA World Cup Updated Hands-On

It was fitting that today in San Francisco we got beaten by USA when playing as England in 2010 FIFA World Cup. While that was a particularly humiliating blow, the event allowed us to find out a whole load more information about the official World Cup game, including penalty shoot-outs, online modes, and the plans for postrelease downloadable content.

As we mentioned in our first hands-on with the game, 2010 FIFA World Cup is much more vibrant than the usual FIFA, which reflects the carnival atmosphere of the tournament itself. However, the development team at EA Sports in Canada has incorporated plenty of gameplay tweaks, as well as new game modes. These are the focus of this GDC preview, so if you're new to the game, check out our previous coverage.
One new improvement is the penalty kick system, which has radically changed since the last FIFA. Each penalty kick will change in terms of difficulty depending on the events surrounding it. For example, a penalty against Fiji when you're 5-0 up will be relatively easy; while the decisive penalty in the World Cup final against Brazil will be much tougher.


The new system is based on a compsure meter that goes back and forth, moving between red in the extremities and green in the center. The idea is to hold the shoot button when the marker is in the green area and then perform a similar maneuver to determine the power. Meanwhile, a blue marker will appear on the screen allowing you to direct the shot, with a small marker allowing pinpoint accuracy if you landed in the green portion of the bar. The position marker appears only in the training mode though; in the real game, you have to make a judgement on how much to tweak the aim of the ball.

With the penalty taker getting more options, it's only fair that the keeper does as well, so thankfully EA Sports has improved this area as well. Keepers now do more to stop the ball than before, automatically moving their arms and legs to knock the ball if they're heading in the right direction. You can also move the keeper up and down the line and perform various taunts, moving your body to try to put the penalty taker off his shot.

While the World Cup mode will allow you to take your favourite team to win the coveted trophy, there's plenty of other stuff to sink your teeth into. The Captain Your Country mode will allow you to work your way up from your nation's B-team, playing as either a famous player or a virtual pro just like in FIFA 10. You'll be able to compete against friends locally in four-player, and as it takes covers qualifiers to the World Cup final itself, this will be the longest mode in the game.

Online will be a massive part of the 2010 FIFA World Cup package, and we got to speak to producer Matt Prior about what to expect. Battle of the Nations will allow each country to see who has the best FIFA players by tracking each individual player online. A points system will award wins, and more points will be awarded for those who play with lower-ranked teams. Hopefully this will avoid the frequent Manchester United vs. Barcelona matches that clogged up FIFA 10 online and help to keep things interesting overall.

There will also be postrelease downloadable content for 2010 FIFA World Cup, although EA Sports wouldn't reveal what it will be or when it will arrive, other than sometime after the launch. The game also introduces a new two-button control system, which should allow novices to get into the game. Pass and shoot will be mapped to A + B, with secondary actions such as run being controlled by the AI.

2010 FIFA World Cup may well be coming out five short months after the last FIFA game, but EA Sports has certainly added a lot to the game. The build we played was feature-complete and was a noticeable improvement over the first version that we played back in London. The game is being released on April 27, so we won't have long to wait to get into the World Cup spirit.



2010 FIFA World Cup and FIFA 10 Ultimate Team Impressions


Today was footie day at GameSpot HQ, as developers from EA Canada came by to show off two of the company's big soccer releases for this year: 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa and the latest edition of the Ultimate Team feature for last year's FIFA 10. I've got some thoughts and observations on both games, but if you want a more complete look at World Cup, check out GameSpot UK's hands-on preview of the game.

2010 World Cup South Africa

It might not be a back-of-the-box feature, but this year's World Cup game has something that no previous FIFA game has seen: women. If you look closely during game introduction, you'll see ladies in the mix who are supporting their favorite teams among the guys wearing jester hats or brightly colored Mohawks. For whatever reason, people go nuts when they see girls at World Cup games, so it's nice to see EA is including the fairer sex this time around.

While I didn't spend a lot of time playing last year's FIFA 10, I like what I've seen of 2010 World Cup's evolution of the FIFA engine. Consider a situation I experienced during my hands-on time with the game:

Playing as Japan (against Cameroon, who was being controlled by EA Canada producer Luke Didd), I gave up a goal I'd never seen in a soccer game before. After my goalkeeper made a wonderful diving block to stop an otherwise certain goal, the ball bounced off his hands and just in front of him. My center half--who was nearby--collapsed down near the ball and over the keeper as he lay on the ground. Desperate to kick the ball free, I tried to move my defenseman close enough to the ball, but his legs were tangled up in the crumpled form of my keeper, which gave the Cameroon striker just enough time to get to the ball and knock in the go-ahead goal. Sure, I was angry at giving up the goal, but the game's attention to the physics of how bodies interact on the pitch was surely impressive.

The good news: 2010 World Cup will let you play a full World Cup tournament online, matching you with players of similar skill levels from the group stage matches, through the knockout rounds, and all the way to the World Cup finals. Matchmaking is random, so you can play a round in your WC tournament at any time and be matched up with a similar player. The not-so-good news: Matchmaking is completely random, so if you and 31 of your friends want to get together to organize a private World Cup tournament online, you're out of luck.

The "Battle of Nations" feature stands intact from previous international tournament games, which were first seen in UEFA Euro 2008. It is a metagame that assesses which nation--among the 199 national teams that were eligible to qualify for the 2010 World Cup--has the most serious FIFA skills. Playing the game will earn you points for your favored nation, but you won't need to play as your country of choice in order to earn points. So with that said, fellow Americans, let's plan on loading up Brazil online and never looking back!

FIFA 10 Ultimate Team

The popular card-collecting series, which began with UEFA Champions League 2006/2007 and has now migrated over to the Madden series, continues in late February. That is when FIFA 10 Ultimate Team is released for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. It will run you 400 Microsoft points or $4.99, respectively. The FIFA team has made several crucial changes to the mode. Here's a look at some of the most notable tweaks:

Unlike in previous years, Ultimate Team in FIFA 10 no longer includes the concept of doing away with excess cards in your collection. The card-collecting album is gone, and though you can still discard cards for coins or put them up for auction, keeping a ton of cards on hand will be to your benefit. Instead of simply focusing on creating a single ultimate team, you'll be able to create multiple teams from your various cards (and even save your various teams in any of 15 available slots).

Why would you want to create different teams? Why, for tournaments, of course. Ultimate Team will have numerous different tournament types, with new tournaments introduced on a regular basis after the game is released. While you'll want to have your most powerful team available for some tourneys, others will challenge you to build teams with very specific requirements (such as a team with a maximum skill level of three stars or fielding a team where no more than two players come from the same club). These various restrictions are another good reason to keep as many cards as possible on hand.

The developers behind FIFA 10 Ultimate Team are clearly putting a premium on playing in tournaments--thanks to tournament modifiers. These modifiers will change depending on the difficulty of the tournament and will affect the amount of coins you earn at the end of the tourney. In addition, one team in a tournament will earn bonus coins by being declared the best team in the tournament. Winning a tournament doesn't necessarily guarantee you this bonus; you still have a chance at it by playing skillfully throughout the tournament, even if you don't pick up the trophy.

Contracts will still play a role in FIFA 10 Ultimate Team, but there is one big change this year. Even if a card's contract is reduced to zero, it won't be automatically removed from your deck. Instead, you'll need to renew the card's contract with...you guessed it...a contract card.

Speaking of cards, there are a few changes to note here, as well. First, FIFA 09 Ultimate Team's gameplay cards--cards that you could play in midgame to affect either your team or your opponent's team--have been removed this year. New to the Ultimate Team deck are rare cards--which are essentially pumped up versions of their regular counterparts. Rare cards can happen for players of any skill level--for instance, you might have a rare card of a player who would normally be found in a silver or bronze pack but a boosted heading ability will elevate him to "rare" status.

Chemistry--or how Ultimate Team players play together on the pitch--is one of the most interesting aspects of Ultimate Team's gameplay, and there are plenty of theories on how to improve your team's chemistry. This year, the parameters for how team chemistry works have opened up a bit. For example, unlike last year, players who play in the same league or the same club in real life will enjoy a boosted chemistry bonus. The developers have also changed how a player's preferred position or formation affects his chemistry rating. For example, a player who normally enjoys playing right wing won't take as a big a chemistry hit if he's playing right midfield on your team. Similarly, a defender who prefers a 4-4-2 formation won't be put off if you change the formation to the very similar 4-4-1-1 formation. - Your club is your own in FIFA 10 Ultimate Team. If you created a team in last year's game, you'll be able to transfer your team name to this year's version. The game will even note the year when your team was established. The bad news? All the coins you earned in FIFA 09 will not transfer over into FIFA 10...because that would just be cheap.


2010 FIFA World Cup Hands-On

As certain as night follows day, it was a sure thing that EA Sports would announce a World Cup game in time for this year's South African tournament. After all, FIFA 10 is now within touching distance of selling 10 million copies, making it one of the most successful games in EA Sports' history. So we pretty much knew what we were in for when we received an invite to a mysterious event in London recently where the division's
Peter Moore lifted the lid on 2010 FIFA World Cup. What did surprise us, however, was just how different a proposition it was from the four-month old FIFA 10, with a much more vibrant look that befits the World Cup tournament. We managed to get hands-on time with the game at Stamford Bridge, where Premier League leaders Chelsea ply their trade, and spoke to producer Simon Humber about what to expect.

"We've been working on the game for 12 months to create the most stunning football game ever," said Humber. This has been achieved, he claims, through enhancing the gameplay, improving the visual authenticity, and capturing the carnival atmosphere of the tournament itself. The gameplay improvements are undoubtedly the most important, but it's certainly a tough job for Humber and his team to top what David Rutter achieved in FIFA 10. "We've something new in every area," he claims, listing 100 improvements in passing, shooting, dribbling, and every other basic gameplay feature in the game. Humber is upfront about other FIFA 10's annoyances, such as the goalies who were too eager to rush out and the fact that it was too easy to chip them as a result. Both issues have been addressed in the World Cup game.

Of course, while FIFA 10 is authentic to domestic football, the World Cup is a different beast entirely. We'll have to wait for the actual tournament to see how this year's event is presented on TV, but early marketing shows a bold colour scheme, and the South African weather should give the whole event a bright visual aesthetic. All these elements have been incorporated into the game, which results in a distinct carnival feel to the tournament. The crowds are vastly improved over FIFA 10--each team has its own 3D supporters, on whom the camera focuses during downtime, wearing their own team colours and waving their nation's flags.

All of the razzmatazz is there, too, with fireworks, confetti, and the new LED ad boards adding to the atmosphere. The FIFA broadcast captions have all been licensed, which means that the matches should have the same feeling whether you're playing them on your console or simply watching the real tournament unfold on TV. Also new are the actual managers for all 199 eligible teams who will bark orders at their teams from the sidelines. And if you take your team through the seven games to go from group stages to the finals of the tournament, you can watch them winning the World Cup as we saw when Humber played a video of England lifting the trophy.

One of the most surprising aspects of 2010 FIFA World Cup is just how much the graphics have changed from a technical perspective. The new lighting engine really adds to the realism of the players, with comparison shots of Ashley Cole and, particularly, Peter Crouch revealing the greatest improvement in the new game. The pitch is similarly improved, with richer, more textured grass clearly shown in Wembley comparison shots. With the carnival atmosphere of the competition added to the game, 2010 FIFA World Cup is substantially different from its predecessor in terms of visuals.

As Humber said during his presentation, this is the first time the World Cup tournament will be playable online. Details are sketchy right now, but there will be a persistent multiplayer mode where you will be able to represent your favourite team against the rest of the world. There'll also be an interactive globe in the game with statistics and news pulled in during the buildup, as well as the competition itself, from FIFA.com. We'll have to wait a little longer before finding out more about these features, but with 300 million FIFA 10 online games played and counting, you can be sure that online will be a huge focus for EA Sports in 2010 FIFA World Cup.

2010 FIFA World Cup will be released on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, and PSP on April 30, leading up to the the tournament itself on June 11. Stay tuned for more info on the game as we get it.



FIFA World Cup 2010 Q&A With Simon Humber

With the 2010 World Cup in South Africa just a few months from now, an official World Cup game from EA Sports was a virtual certainty. After all, the publisher behind the tremendously popular FIFA series has produced the last three licensed World Cup games, beginning with World Cup 98 on the original PlayStation, the first WC game produced by the company after obtaining the license in 1997. For the upcoming FIFA World Cup 2010, EA is throwing a good deal of its development muscle behind the online features; the game will feature an online World Cup that will let you play as any of the 199 nations that participate in the FIFA, taking on other players around the world to claim sports' most prestigious prize.

We recently had a chance to speak with FIFA World Cup 2010's line producer Simon Humber to learn more about the game's features ahead of its April 27 release, as well as the process of putting together a World Cup game while at the same time continuing to work on the next entry in the long-standing FIFA series.

GameSpot: In World Cup years, you have two soccer games released in the same year from EA Sports. How do you decide which features will be in the World Cup games and which will be reserved for FIFA? 

Simon Humber: Well, some features are uniquely suitable for World Cup, and others would be common to any of our football titles. Essentially my team looks at the preceding FIFA, works out what needs to be enhanced, and then looks at the World Cup and what that means to people and creates a set of features that give a World Cup experience to people who can't get to South Africa. "Everyone can play in the 2010 FIFA World Cup" is the mantra we work to.

It's not as if [FIFA lead producer David] Rutter and myself end up wrestling on the floor of his office to decide what features go into each game! We have long-term plans we revise each year and work through the prioritized feature ideas getting as many as we can into each game we release. The World Cup is a spectacular event, and we wanted to capture the excitement and the atmosphere, so the first thing you'll notice about the game is how good it looks. It looks really good. In a way, we're lucky in that we get to tell a story and we know it's all building to the climactic ending in Soccer City on July 11. Since we know the ending and there is just one ending, we can put together a bunch of great visual features to support the run to the final. Take a look at the images, and you'll see things such as:

• A gorgeous new pitch: Our pitch simply wasn't good enough, so we've made it look superb.
• Lighting of the players and environment: Clever changes to the lighting makes everything look more realistic.
• Camera flashes: You'll see all the fans in the crowd using their cameras.
• Seat cards: Fans hold up cards to form national flags and emblems in a show of patriotism.
• Fans: Close-up shots on supporters cheering on their team or despairing in anguish.
• Confetti rains down from the sky in the team colors and stays on the pitch all game.
• Streamers create a carnival atmosphere as they glide to the ground.
• Populated benches: Characters sit on the benches rather than being empty.
• Broadcast graphics: The same captions you've seen in FIFA tournament broadcasts.
• Close-up celebration camera: To really feel the goal-scoring moment, the camera zooms in close to the player as he responds to your celebration commands.
• New players and managers: More content for star heads and many of the team managers.[England national team manager Fabio] Capello looks brilliant, and [notoriously tall English footballer] Peter Crouch no longer looks like a naughty elf.

GS: What's the main aim for FIFA World Cup 2010 in terms of gameplay and AI improvements? Are there any control changes we need to know about? 

SH: The game is not just about visuals, though. The gameplay has over 100 enhancements--some major, others subtle--so players will notice a difference in how World Cup plays compared to FIFA. So here are just a few of the improvements you'll get in World Cup. We'll talk about other aspects of gameplay closer to release.

Responsiveness:

• New chest traps that allow you to chest the ball in the direction you want to go rather than having to take midair touches after a chest to change direction.
• The ability to let a ball drop over your shoulder and move off in the direction of ball travel. Great for preserving momentum with lofted through balls.
• Improved the problem of trapping the ball too far and being "stunned," then taking too long to go and dribble the ball.
• Defensively players will now clear an aerial ball rather than do a chest trap first when you are asking for a clearance.

Goalkeeper:

• Improved the "narrowing down the angle" logic so the keeper doesn't come out so soon and so far, making him vulnerable to the chip shot.
• Ability to change his save direction if there is a deflection.
• Added variety to punching, which results in punches sometimes not clearing the ball out of danger.

CPU Teams:

• Added more skill moves for the CPU to use depending on a player's flair attribute or trait.
• Better understanding of game context and situation, resulting in more intelligent changes of tactics/mentality.
• Manager now looks at who he has as subs and will attempt to give star players on the bench some playing time (i.e. Fabregas for Spain; Pato for Brazil). Previously he would rely solely on match rating and fatigue, leading to unrealistic substitutions or the same one over and over again.

Positioning:

• Teammates will now take more factors into account when looking into space inside the box when they are making a run for a cross to be delivered. I can verify how exciting this is having seen the way that Emile Heskey bulldozed his way onto the end of a cross in Andorra the other day.
• Improved marking for when the CB pushes up to the ball possessor when he shouldn't, leaving the team vulnerable to an easy through ball and 1-on-1 with the GK.

Shooting:

• Improved the realism of where players strike the ball to give more off-center strikes leading to more swerve and variety in ball trajectory.
• Changed the chip shot to make it more challenging and also to improve the feel of it--more backspin, better trajectory.

Passing:

• Added personality to crosses to allow better players to put in more driven crosses into the box.
• Added chest and shoulder passes.
• Lowered the amount of power you can get on backwards crosses and backwards lofted through balls, forcing you to roughly have to face the way you want to pass it to for these types of kicks to succeed.

Set Pieces:

• Ability to trigger a teammate run on a quick free kick.
• Lowered the likelihood of the CPU scoring from FKs--they were too good.

There are also brand-new features for gameplay. I am allowed to mention that each team will play differently at home or away if under CPU control. For example, Northern Ireland are great at Windsor Park, so they are way harder to beat there than they are on their travels. That makes qualifying for the World Cup Finals feel much more realistic, as you can beat the smaller nations at home quite easily, but away from home you may have an unexpected battle on your hands, and they are the games that define who qualifies.

GS: How much of World Cup's on-the-pitch gameplay serves as a "proof of concept" for gameplay ideas in future FIFA installments? Is there anything new in World Cup 2010 that fans will see refined or improved in FIFA 11? 

SH: The fundamentals of gameplay are ever improving and evolving, so every improvement in that area for World Cup will be refined and honed even more for FIFA. The game will get better and better with each iteration, and World Cup marks the finest football game EA have ever produced. There's the occasional feature where we would consider taking a real chance outside of FIFA. If you look back at UEFA Euro 2008, I really wanted to try out user-controlled celebrations. There were some skeptics, but we pushed ahead, and now it's a core feature of gameplay which you can use or ignore.

There are new things for World Cup which should end up in FIFA. But right now they are unannounced, so you'll have to be patient on that info. 

GS: How is the development team organized for the World Cup games? Is it a completely separate team, or do certain folks work on both games? 

SH: The gameplay team make all of our gameplay, regardless of whether it's FIFA 10, 2010 FIFA World Cup, or future football games. So as soon as FIFA 10 was over we sat down and worked out how we could improve what we had. It was very amusing to read so many reviews wondering how we could improve on FIFA 10, as the hardcore players know there is always room to improve and we are totally dedicated to making our games better and better and better. While there is one gameplay team who continually refine and improve the experience on the pitch be that for FIFA 10 or World Cup, everything else is a separate and devoted team on World Cup. We're all located in the same space as the FIFA team, and so there's much sharing of ideas and knowledge.

The World Cup is such a massive and important event, and this is the biggest World Cup game we have ever produced. It features every team in the world who took part. It is by far the best-looking and sounding game we have ever made and features many new innovate modes particularly in the online space. To be able to bring all that takes a massive effort and a completely separate team of about the same size as FIFA's but with a different creative outlook since you all want a new game, not a FIFA 10 clone. 

GS: In previous years, the FIFA team has made no bones about wanting to bring the World Cup online. How does this game's online tournament mode fulfill that ambition? 

SH: I am happy to say we have achieved that completely. For the first time ever, we have managed to get the entire finals tournament online so that when you play online you will always be matched up against another human player regardless of the time of day or night. You'll choose your team and then play the three group matches, attempting to finish in the top two before heading into the knockout phase where you're four wins away from lifting the FIFA World Cup Trophy amidst a cacophony of confetti cannons and fireworks on a cool Johannesburg night. Without a doubt it's the most exciting online mode we've put together and the perfect way to build up to a match on TV or carry on the experience after a broadcast.

I expect this experience to really speak to our core gamers, and I get sweaty palms every time I test the mode and feel the pressure of tournament football for myself. 

GS: From a player's point of view, how will players compete in the World Cup online? How will tournaments be organized? Will player skill be taken into consideration when deciding seeding? 

SH: We have made it as simple as possible. Essentially the online tournament will feel exactly like the offline tournament with the obvious difference that you are pitting your skills against real-world players rather than the CPU. The player will simply pick their team, according to the size of the challenge they want, and enter into the competition. They are then matched up against players in the same round of the competition and progress as they would normally through the group stage and knockout rounds. Wherever possible, we adhere to the rules of the competition, so in the group stage you wouldn't be matched up against players who have the same team as you, and in the knockout stages you wouldn't meet any opponent from the group stage until the appropriate round. These are the rules of the real competition, and they have been factored into the mode. The only caveat to that is if the only other player available online has one of those teams. We are all avid online gamers, and the most frustrating thing about playing online can be waiting to find an opponent, so as a last resort you could get matched with the same team, but in reality this is very unlikely.

Player skill is not factored into matchmaking; instead, we use the Battle of the Nations to encourage better gamers to choose weaker teams so they earn more points for their nation on the leaderboard. So what you will see is a much more varied use of teams than normal ranked gameplay. Playing as a smaller team will earn you more points, so don't be surprised to see the likes of Tahiti or Andorra featured. This creates a much more interesting online experience than the usual battle of five-star teams and worked out well on EURO. 

GS: Beyond competing for the World Cup, what other online features will be in the game? Will you be able to play on the same team with other players online, for example? 

SH: I'll have to take the fifth on this question at the moment. There will be other online announcements at a later date though, and they are exciting. 

GS: An odd question, but with regard to the Battle of the Nations feature, how do you balance the feature to make up for large population variances (and thus the installed base of players) between different countries? Do relatively small countries like Honduras or Switzerland have even a hope of victory here? 

SH: Not an odd question at all. It's one at the front of our minds since in the past there have been some poorly implemented attempts to have rankings for groups.

We have online usage data that gives us a pretty good idea of how many players will be from each country. We'll use that as the starting point to create a level playing field. Then after the game has been out a week we intend to look at the actual usage figures and make any adjustments needed. The intention is that it comes down to gamer skill rather than big or small populations being favored.

GS: We understand that this year's game will include altitude effects in certain stadiums. How will this affect gameplay? 

SH: Altitude will affect gameplay realistically but subtly. We saw the effect altitude can have during the qualifiers when Argentina got thrashed away against Bolivia 6 to 1. Undoubtedly Argentina are the stronger side, but on the night they just couldn't handle the altitude. If you have ever been at high altitude you know that it can really sap your stamina, and you'll see that effect in game.
Likewise, the ball physics will be subtly different; the ball will fly a bit faster and straighter since there is less air resistance. You're not going to be able to hit 50-yard screamers into the top corner, but shots will be harder but also a bit more difficult to keep low.
It's not going to create unrealistic gameplay and might not be picked up on by some people. But the gameplay engine is quite mature now, and we can start to play with this type of thing to go a bit deeper on the experience. 

GS: OK, wrapping up, let's have a World Cup prediction or two. Who is your dark horse to make a deep World Cup run, and who do you think wins it all? 

SH: I'm going to steer away from England so I don't jinx them, and regardless, we don't have a good enough keeper. Assuming we don't win, I'd like Spain to win since they have been playing amazing football for the last two years. My dark horse would be one of the African teams. I suspect that on their continent one of them will make a run to the semifinal.

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