Brink for £3.85

Brink for £3.85 here

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Free MMOFPS season is open:Tribes Ascend hits Steam ,Ghosts are in your PC machine, and there's DUST in your Playstation Eye

A deluge of seemingly free to play MMOFPS games is waiting to rain down on you mere mortal gamer... 


All PC games lead to Steam , well enough of the good stuff these days anyway... And so it came to pass that the phoenix known as Tribes Ascend risen from the ashes of the great Tribes series ( ask your granpappy) now sores among the clouds of Steam ... and totally free ( well watch out for the paid for cheaters boosted XP option) 

All these games seem to be free take the launch of the DUST 514 beta today , totally free the coders of E.V.E. promised , except for the paid for one off cheaters boosted XP option..

With the likes of Crytek also suffering a Crysis of conscience over which freemium model to adopt for their next opus we must all endevour to persevere in keeping free to play games free , and not be tempted by the paid for XP booster packs.


Or simply wake up to the fact that nothing is really free ,least of all in the world of games and they will make their money out of you some how some where down the line , or go bust trying.. 

Looking at DUST for the PS3 , I am overcome with sadness , not at the game but the realisation the PS3 as a platform and PSN is now in a twilight phase , PS4 has to hit March 2013 or Sony go the way of Nintendo and Sega .. that means gamers we have few precious months in which to take advantage of PSN as it is .What are the coders of E.V.E. hoping to achieve with DUST, maybe pull as many console gamers over to the PC as possible? And how long are any of these games going to be maintained ? 

Paid for MMOS start losing money about a year after launch. Big franchises struggle to maintain existence even 6 months after launch. In the case of DUST how long will Sony keep it's servers going , are you willing to put in all that time for one game and then have someone turn the switch off ? Several hundred Star Wars Galaxies fans were suddenly silenced by SOE earlier this year. 


The same holds true for any of the so called free to play games and Betas launched this week , including Tribes Ascend on Steam, Ghost Recon Online , and DUST 514. 

In olden days online gaming meant dedicated servers , people using their machines as servers and there was no need for the locked and finite life spanned private company owned servers we see accompanying games today. 


It seems a shame that now we have quality broadband ,  free to play , and paid for MMOFPS games , we still have not seen an evolution in how these game worlds are maintained and sustained in cyberspace... 


This in an age where terrabytes of useless twitterings , photos , videos etc can be stored and maintained for 100s of millions , so why can't a softco maintain a MMO for a few hundred thousand or million gamers? Why don't Google or Facebook take over the hosting of MMOs and free to play games? 


Take the wonder that was Battlefield 1 and 2 on the PC , the kudos of that series never came about from what D.I.C.E. threw into the often broken launched games , but from the community that created a thousand mods and updates.. see any of that with Battlefield 3? Just get in line to be fleeced for the premium DLC pack with the rest of the sheep... Till you do the same with Battlefield 4. 


So whilst I love all the free stuff ,I worry about whether any record will remain of the talent and hard work that has gone into creating these gaming worlds and experiences, as once the servers are downed the game is gone along with all the time you as a player invested. 


Funny how I am able to show someone Tie Fighter or Wing Commander running on DOS on the new iPad but I will never be able to show anyone the likes of Star Wars Galaxies or any of the above MMO/FPS games once the servers are downed. 


Similarly it is no accident that Facebook has gamers in the hundreds of millions , players can be confident the games will be around , including their lovely turnip and beetroot farm for years. Spare a thought for a once proud  Star Wars Galaxies online moisture farmer ...


The coders of MMOs and MMOFPS have to evolve the way they host or stream their content so it is platform agnostic and persistent , that is what all those wonderfully banal Facebook gaming success stories are doing. 


Right now I could download close to a terrabyte of Free to Play content , but none of these games has an end , other than when the developer chooses to pull the plug or money runs out , just think of the pain the Warcraft nation is going to face when that gets pulled.


oh the humanity....... millions of gold farmers silenced in an instant...

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Blacklight: Retribution Free to Play now on Steam

Zombie, Inc's Black Light Retribution is the latest MMOFPS to go free to play on Steam , if anything can counter the casual demise of gaming , then it is  the power of the likes of Steam to deliver totally free to play games and keep the core away from those angry aves and fart apps , remember the core is father the core is mother ... 

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How and why Bohemia Interactive's ARMA II franchise ruled the Steam summer 2012 sale

It is said that the Call of Duty and Medal of Honour and even the great D.I.C.E.s Battlefield series have all lost their way being watered down by suits on high to cater for the now failing and positively geriatric next gen console generation.


Whilst those same suits are now beginning to recognise the PC as THE fastest growing platform with Windows 8 Apps, Steam, Onlive, Gaikai, millions of legacy series that are more loved today by fans than the execs who abandoned them and resigned the once great PC talent of Infinity Ward , DICE ,Treyarch et al to make call of honor 12 hardened battle softcore casual edition could ever imagine.

For over a decade those execs believed PCs to be a 2nd rate option and these casual shooter series though still ported to run faster on PC  don't get shown the love or the money by PC gamers. 


Are you a Mod, a console Rocker or a casual Punk? To succeed on PC these execs cannot rely on the added GPU and CPU muscle in our PCs, they need to free the code that they release so people can mod games. Many softcos already realise this and are reaping the benefits.


Take Bohemia Interactive's  ARMA series, the love for that series by PC fans and exclusively PC fans continues, from the days we first got to play with and edit and mod Operation Flashpoint. BECAUSE we got to mod Operation Flaspoint  and even if you did not spend the time developing your own mod , you could look forward to the games community doing it for you .  As we did with Battlefield 2 which has to this day one of the largest modding communities. Now DICE has lost its way with Battlefield 3, there are no great PC mods or total conversions that set the PC gaming community alight, all we are going to get is official Origin delivered DLC. How cool would it be if EA let gamers submit there mods to Origin like Bethesda and Steam are doing with Steamworks and the likes of Skyrim? 


Freedom to mess with games for PC gamers is an inalienable right and creates a unique and mutual respect between developer and gamer this is what has kept the likes of ARMA II at the top of the Steam 2012 sale , throughout that sale , any execs who wish to hold on to their expensive suits in 2013 would do well to pay attention ...simply releasing new hardware is not going to be enough.


Today's PC gamer has grown tired of ageing consoles of their youth not because the hardware has aged, but because of the lack of respect hardware and software developers have for us  with neutered gameplay, sub teen infested multiplayer and being dictated to by developers,publishers and so called platform holders.. 

Tomorrows games are going to have to cater for a console generation that has grown up to become today's PC gamer with all the freedoms and many ways of playing , purchasing and improving games this PC next gen is used to. Facing off against  Windows 8, Apps, Android , iOS, streaming and cloud gaming the next generation of consoles which will again not allow any of the freedoms we love on PC is going to be an epic fail. Developers who were traditionally locked to one platform will also fail. We are rapidly approaching the time when there is no place in living rooms for consoles, in fact we nearing the time when the majority of our time gaming and doing others things is done without  switching on and tempting the Red Ring or Yellow flash of death... In the next round of console releases  I predict that one of the big boys Nintendo or Sony will leave the console field altogether just as Sega and Atari before them, and Coleco and  Magnavox... you know what I'm talkin bout Willis?


They used to talk about the death of PC gaming , but now you have to consider the console as a games delivery service ...it's dead Jim and I find that fascinating....absolutely fascinating ....


class dismissed... 


Check out ARMA 2 now on the Steam sale , remember the DLC is also 40% off and all of of the above also applies to the other game that has remained at the top of the Steam summer 2012 sale Skyrim too has 50% off hurry though today is the last day!

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Borderlands 2 Season Pass 25% off for £15

Borderlands 2 is something most people cannot get enough of and now you can have even more with the Borderlands 2 Season Pass for just £15 from.. Green Man Gaming of course... which should keep you knee deep in looted weapons till next June by which time Borderlands 3 will have been announced...

25% off Digital downloads* with this voucher code: GMG25-EVFWS-4Z4ZN

 

Simply copy the above voucher and paste into the 'Voucher code' box in the check out to get your discount

 

Offer ends Monday 8th October 2012 at 11.00UTC

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Battlefield 1942 is FREE on ORIGIN now ! And the best part is after 10 years it is bug free and the AI works too

If you started playing Battlefield with the latest iteration, then you missed out some of the finest ebb and flow fps and vehicular battles ever committed to binary.

EA and D.I.C.E. feel your pain and so have released Battlefield 1942 free on Origin. 

Another reason to love PC gaming. See you on the Battlefield. Of course what would be really cool would be if D.I.C.E.  released Codename Eagle to the great unwashed masses ...or made a sequel.

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Planetside 2 : another reason no gamer should be without a PC ..

Gaming is a great waste of time , the greatest waste of time yet created . if you are going to indulge then you should do so in the finest way possible.  The finest way of course is with a PC , even on the lowest settings running on a laptop with just an Intel HD3000 Planetside 2 looks more beautiful than any console game.

Then you realise the experience is totally free ( pay if you want trinkets and baubles) and the irony of this game coming from Sony Online Entertainment. I jest for Sony are more clued up than other companies  for the changes that free to play models will bring to both PC and the next next gen of consoles when they arrive, having picked up GAIKAI , launched Playstion Plus, Home and now continuing to support free to play on PC with Planetside 2.

What does Planetside2 bring that all the other staple FPS games and MMOFPS games don`t? Well this really is WAR ... there are so many combatants doing so many things at the same time it never feels like just a game of capture the hill or flag... For starters the levels are huge , the vehicles are huge , the bases are leviathan ..gargantuan .. and have so many points of interest to defend attack manufacture from that you never have a moment of peace ..which is what makes this a thoroughly good war...  

There is currently nothing that can touch PC gaming and free to play releases  like Hawken,Mechwarrrior Online and Planetside 2 are perfect examples of why you should put that console pad down and get yourself a decent gaming pc or laptop.. they are also examples of the longevity of PC gaming .. 

as you can see in the video below : 

if you are ready to get experienced sign up here 

so lets take a look at one of the bases you defend in daylight :it looks impressive ...

where did all the Naa`vi go ? 

as the battle rages time passes and dusk falls , night comes and the graphics which looked impressive in daylight look even more so being lit up with blaster fire from rival factions still hard at work defending or attacking :

nope still no Naa`vi.... 

and here is one of the those things I go up in and come crashing down in seconds..yes the flight controls are traditionally fiddly ...

stages stretch off into the distance 

in fact into the distant distance...

all day and all of the night of course

the best way to fly , the only way to fly when you cannot fly ..is to be a passenger like so ..waving to your friends below...

hello down there ....

the vistas are not just all metal alloy either ..there are lush green plains.. with useful trees to hide behind,,,

If you are still here you know you should be downloading by now .. the thing about MMO games is they do not last , so enjoy this gem whilst you can and remember to take breaks  console fans ..PC gaming can be addictive..see you Planetside..

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Planetside 2 : Day 2 New Conglomerate Indar mass tank raiding all day and night

Yesterday I was pleasantly surprised how well the launch of Planetside 2 went. Not just the working servers,quick install and the speed it ran even with massive environments and architecture using just an Intel HD3000, but the way that there was a massive crowd of gamers all interacting, with such a large crowd you naturally tend to move away from lone wolf gaming and literally go tribal joining in massive ( I use that word a lot when it comes to Planetside 2) assaults and raids on your enemy...as I ended up doing today in a tank raid... did I say tank raid , I meant land and air assault with jetpacking soldiers , armoured heavy soldiers , cloaked snipers , 3 wheel hog driving scouts , medics and more ..as you can tell from the video below . 

All in all my 2nd day of play really  drove home how simply awesome PC gaming can be .. 

Whilst embedded with my fellow New Conglomerate faction ( think Firefly rebels but wearing more yellow) I managed to some more snaps to convey some of the majesty of this game .. 

First I thought I would check out some of the architecture on Indar : 

I also got a little better at flying .. lasting almost a minute before my usual Kamikazi routine ..banzaiiiii!...

I was in game primarily to test how the game ran on my hardware when I started noticing tanks mustering... 

naturally I had to follow and pretty soon I was part of a massive  air and land assault sweeping everything before it ... 

as we approached the enemy base the sun began to set ..with dusk approaching ...

sans tank at this point but soon that would change ..base after base fell ( this is my war story ....for the actual sequence of events watch the video above) any way base after base fell:

into the night .. attacking,supporting defending with an army of people all doing the same .. PC gaming and gaming in general does not get much better than this...

And that is the power of Planetside 2  with it`s massive battles,massive architecture and landscapes, this is a game you are going to want to sit around the twitter or facebook fire and tell (tall) tales of your great battles and victories..however small your actual contribution ...the game still makes you feel part of a that collective achievement or loss.. as a result you are more likely to come back and play again seeking more material for your next Planetside 2 war story ... which I will be doing again tomorrow... see you Planetside... sign up for the game here .. and yes console fans it really is free... 

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