I'm sure there are plenty, but I was wondering who out there plays MMOs and what you are playing?

I've been playing Vanguard lately and BF2 every once in a while.

Gwiz665 and I are playing Horde on Lightning Hoof, US! We'd love for any Sifters to join us.

I've got a fancy guild with fancy bank tabs and fancy mats for your leveling pleasure.

I would be willing to help you out with my fancy level 80!

My main's name is Lallu. She's a lonely troll priest looking for someone to hold hands with and take long walks on the beaches of Darkshore, admiring the corpses of newly dead night elves.

See you there, hopefully!

[WoW=World of Warcraft, but if you didn't know that, chances are this Sift Talk isn't for you.]

The developer of the game World of Goo has made an offer that games shouldn't refuse. In honor of the 1 year anniversary of the game, they are selling it for donations until Oct 19th - you can donate what you feel is right and get a free license for the game.

The game is very amusing and I recommend it for everyone. I've bought it for $5, what will you give?



http://www.videosift.com/video/World-of-Goo-new-crazy-cool-indie-game-trailer

http://www.videosift.com/video/At-the-core-of-the-World-of-Goo



Get it at: http://2dboy.com/games.php

I've recently bought sins of a solar empire... damn thing took hours to play a map.
Then Dawn of War 2, which was much better, but had some weak spots with the AI and the maps, and the campaign can be beat in a coffee break (slight exaggeration)

However, tropico 3, with a slower pace, is the BOMB. Anyhow don't listen to me, download the demo. I got mine off steam.

Digg shares an Unreality article on ten fan-made trailers, with their embedded YouTube videos to video game movies -- "It's pretty obvious that pretty much every movie that has ever been based on a video game has been utter crap. When the best of the genre are Silent Hill and the Resident Evil series, you know you're in trouble. Quite simply, movie producers and directors don't 'get' the games they turn into movies, and if they do, those games should have never been adapted into movies to begin with. Video game fans, it seems, have a much better idea about what the genre should be -- if it's bad arse, make it bad arse, and if it's silly, well, make it silly. After the jump, take a look at the work of said fans, and enjoy ten awesome trailers to fan-made video game movies..."

Digg shares a four pages GameRadar article, with embedded YouTube videos, on "the evolution of Japanese game commercials. 30 years of daft, brilliant and disturbingly odd television/TV/telly skits. Japan has a well-earned reputation for daft, brilliant and disturbingly odd TV game commercials, but it took a long (sometimes painful) evolution along a course signposted by geeky TV celebs in bad jumpers during the 1980s and PlayStation-sophistication in the 1990s, for that rep to be won and maintained.

Back at the end of the 1970s, Japanese gamecorps started trying to convince their public that games were not something to be afraid of; that they were a perfectly reasonable, legitimate form of entertainment, like shogi or fishing. Once the Famicom Era kicked off, those same softcos dropped their polite, civilised image and began to go berserk all over Japan's telly screens with "CMs" (as the Japanese refer to "adverts" or "commercials") that were powerful enough to rip a viewer's mind open and sew it back together within the space of 15 seconds, discreetly lodging a MUST SHOP! impulse somewhere in the frontal lobe before the skit was over.

The evolution was televised, so join us as we trace its path from 1979 to 2009..."

http://ccinsider.comedycentral.com/2009/08/31/the-colbert-reports-ftwiest-gaming-moments/ from http://digg.com/television/Colbert_s_Best_Gaming_Moments

As I was lost in my world of delusions the other day, I thought of this.

As has been well-documented, nobody likes the rockish Zero Punctuation theme that is grafted onto the beginning and end of those otherwise stellar videos.

It would be pretty cool if someone with the time, creativity, and comprehensive knowledge of music (i.e. not me) edited the theme out of the videos and replaced that hideous noise with relevant opening and closing music, a la the old videos. A bad example...

Prince of Persia
Opener: Lawrence of Arabia Main Theme
Closer: No Idea

Gar, I meant to post some excellent examples of possible changes, but I can't think of any right now, and I probably won't be able to think of any for quite some time. Leave your better ideas (or edited videos) in the comments.

Anybody remember the challenge from Yahtzee's Prototype vs. InFamous video? Well we have the results: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/op-ed/6228-Yahtzees-Prototype-vs-InFamous-Challenge

So today I turn on my laptop to behold a blue screen with white letters. I didn't have to read anything to know I had finally, for the first time in my life, encountered the 'Blue Screen of Death'. I suppose it's expected since I've had my laptop for 5 years.

So here's my query; What the heck do you do with a dead laptop? I mean besides using the motherboard as a very expensive (and unstable) coaster.

http://minecraft.net

and its only in alpha. amazingly addictive, immediately gratifying sandbox style game. java, browser based.

lots more planned for it, and already a great time. reminds me of Angband, only in 3D.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/digitalnation/

So this is my first post on sift talk, and I thought I would try and wait until I had something that I suspect would interest most of you. If you haven't seen it already, PBS and Frontline are putting together a pretty fascinating online series of documentaries centered around the idea that what will ultimately define our age is digital technology.

Frontline has done some docs like this one before, but this one is particularly cool because its content and its primary mode of exhibition are married.

So far they have released two "chapters." I guess they are going by country, because part one deals with Korea... specifically with video games and video game/internet addiction. The second chapter deals with America's emergent robotic military.

The other thing I wanted to bring up is actually a question for the veteran sifters and I guess Dag specifically. PBS video has embed codes; is it possible to post these? I couldn't get it to work. ;(

Cheers!

I wasn't there, but I've been pouring through all the online coverage. Kotaku had this article, showing what a media research company had measured as having created the most "buzz".



Personally, I've got to agree that NATAL generated my biggest "WOW" of the event. However, of the products on display that will be purchasable in the next 6-9 months, Assassin's Creed 2 has me most excited, with Brutal Legend second, and God of War 3 and Mass Effect 2 fighting for third place.

So, what's everyone else excited about?

When I was a young gamer, around the age of 8, my father purchased a copy of Duke Nukem 3D for me. I was very fond of this game since at the ripe age of eight I was able to express a healthy sexual curiosity by throwing wads of cash at pixelated strippers to see virtual bewwbs. Not to mention I got to kill a bunch of crazy monsters with things like shrink rays and freeze guns etc.

Shortly after the original DN3D franchise and around the time Unreal first hit the shelves they announced they would be making a new game "Duke Nukem Forever" based on a new 3D engine the virtual strippers would satisfy my hormone riddled body to be sure.

But alas, it was not to be. Like wondering who is on the other side of a glory hole, i could hear mumbles and grumbles from the studio frequently but never the full frontal nudity that I sought.

Years went by and they taunted me relentlessly. A trailer here, a fake demo there; until finally my agony was over. 3D realms announced that they were closing their doors because they hadnt put out a game in over ten years.

Then, today, without warning, they announced this horrible bit of news:
"3D Realms asserts that "Despite rumors and statements to the contrary," (such as the Goodbye on their own website), the company "has not closed and is not closing," according to a press release issued to Shacknews."

Why do they delight in haunting me?!?!

Thoughts on this? Anyone else feel the same way?

Link to the new press release here:
http://www.bluesnews.com/cgi-bin/board.pl?action=viewstory&threadid=98427

I've made this trailer for a pack of user generated content for UT3.

Well since I made it, I can't sift it, so I'll just post it here maybe someone would like to sift it

Actually torn, vimeo looks better than youtube's basic embed, but youtube's HD is better

(seems i can't embed here)

http://vimeo.com/4638965

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yoWdRlHVUw

http://www.leveloneboss.com/2009/04/south-parks-top-20-funniest-clips-about.html (NSFW too) from http://digg.com/gaming_news/South_Park_s_Top_20_Funniest_Clips_About_Video_Games_VIDS

"Who would have thought that after all this time, Trey Parker & Matt Stone's creation would still be (a) hilarious, (b) relevant, and (c) consistently brilliant? Here are The 20 Funniest Video Game Scenes From South Park on one page."

Have any of you tried the new videogame Demigod?

I just bought it last night and so far it's been hella-fun. It's a mix of warlords battlecry with Defense of the Ancients (warcraft 3 mod).

I know there are some gamers here *glances at NicoleBee* so it would be cool if ya'll would come play with me.

Or else I'll just have to play with myself, as usual...

Let's be honest: work is boring. I need some flash games to get me through the conference calls.

I know the concept of a game section on The Sift has come up before but until that happens: what are YOUR favorite games?

So I've finally gotten off my butt and ordered all the parts to build a new PC. I was running:

(built 2004)
3.2 Ghz P4 (single core with hyperthreading)
400mhz bus speed
250 GB IDE Maxtor
NVidia 7800 AGP
2 GB pc2700 ram

New system:

Core i7 920
Gigabyte EX58-UD3R
4 GB PC10666 DDR3 (I'm staying with XP, will upgrade ram after new Windows comes out)
EVGA GTX 260 894mb
640 GB SATA HD
Blu-ray burner

So the reason for the post, other than shameless self-promotion, is I need to build it and test the hell out of it. Can anyone recommend any "burn-in" programs, etc? Remember, I'm sticking with XP 32-bit for now.

All told, with parts, etc, I spent just over 12. All to make my porn look better.