Homebrew

Mirror's Edge was an interesting design for a game that didn't really fullfill its expectation. However one of the cool things about the first person action game was its more surreal time trial levels that were released as downloadable content after the main game shipped to stores. Now a few enterprising folks at the Beyond Unreal forums have figured out a way to create a Mirror's Edge level editor.

Basically the procedure is coping a few Unreal Tournament 3 editor files into Mirror's Edge which is obviously not approved by either Epic Games nor the game's developer Digital Illusions. The move does seem to work well enough that a few new Mirror's Edge levels had been made. However messing with game files is always a risk so don't blame us if your game is broken afterwards.

Last May Havok, the game physics software company that was bought by Intel a number of months ago, released free versions of its Havok Physics and Havok Animation tools for amateur game creators to use in their projects. Today the companies announced plans for the Havok Physics Innovation Contest which will give a $40,000 cash prize to the winning teams who makes a playable demo of a game using those free tools.

Gamasutra reports that four such winners will be picked by a panel of judges and the winning game demos will be shown at the 2008 Game Developers Conferences. The winning team members will also get an All Access pass to GDC in addition to the cash prize. Unfortunately the Gamasutra story does not have a link to the actual contest page. We will update this story when we get that link. Update: We now have the contest link for all of you to check out.

Epic Games launched their second major "Make Something Unreal" mod making contest earlier this year and today the developer announced the Phase 1 winners of the contest in 10 categories. The contest used Epic's 2007 shooter Unreal Tournament 3 as its basis for creating the levels and mods. Each category has first through fifth place winners who receive $2,500, $2,000, $1,500, $1,000 and $500, respectively. In addition, the first place winners in the categories of Best Deathmatch Level, Best Capture the Flag Level, Best Vehicle Capture the Flag Level, Best New Game Type, and Best Character/Customization Pack will each receive a new PC built by Velocity Micro containing dual quad core Intel Core 2 Extreme processors.

This is just Phase 1 of the contest. Phase 2 entries will be accepted starting September 30 with the cut-off date being Oct. 17. Catagories in Phase 2 are Best Game Mod, Best New Character/Customization Pack, Best New Vehicle, Best Warfare Level, Best vCTF Level, Best Deathmatch or CTF Level, Best Machinima, Best Graphics in Map, and Best Use of Physics. Meanwhile you can check out the Phase 1 winners after the jump.

With all of the raves about Spore's easy to use tools to make characters and structures, it's ironic that the week of Spore's release yet another game announcement involves its own simple-to-use creation tools. The game and editor is called Atmosphir, developed by San Fransisco based Minor Studios and was revealed as part of the TechCrunch 50 conference today.

The game itself looks like Super Mario 64; it has the same kind of low end graphics and platform based gameplay. However, as the above intro trailer shows, it's really the level creation tools that are the star of Atmosphir with drag-and-drop tools that make creating levels look as much fun as playing the game, if not more so. Levels created in the game can be shared online with others. Atmosphir is scheduled to be released as a free download in late 2008 and Minor Studios is currently signing up beta testers.

When Bioware finally announced more details on their long awaited fantasy RPG Dragon Age: Origins they also announced that the game would come with a full toolset for folks who wanted to make their own levels and content for the game. Now the first newsletter for those future world builders has been released with more info on what the toolkit will have.

The toolkit will allow folks to make their own full single player adventures with a script editor available to change creature AI and combat for making "detailed action sequences full of heart-pounding party-based tactical combat." If you happen to be going to Penny Arcade Expo at the end of the month you can attend a special presentation where Bioware team members will give a live demo showing off the features of the Dragon Age: Origins toolkit.

Digital Illusions' upcoming first person action game Mirror's Edge is generated a lot of buzz and much of that was created when journalists got to see a level of the near-future themed game at E3. The demo was filmed and shown on the Internet to show off the title's use of running and jumping to scale the game's buildings.

That trailer was used as the basis for a homebrew created level by the designer known only as "EvilWeevil" as a level for Valve's classic 2007 action-puzzle game Portal. While the level (shown on the 1Up.com site as a video) is not exactly complete it does show that even trailers of games can inspire third party level designers to re-create what they have seen in other games.

Going through the BYOC area of QuakeCon, it's clear that the men and women who play LAN games all day and into the night have some elaborate set-ups that they have created to game on their PCs. However, it's one thing to put a clear side on your case and add a few lights. It's quite another to create, say, a PC case from Legos (as we see above) or in the cases you will see in our gallery feature.

There's quite the variety of cases at QuakeCon this year; large, small, bright, dark and ...well, you can see for yourself as you check out the many different homemade cases. We hope to see a few more and add to the gallery later this weekend.

This year's E3 manifests the industry's dearth of creativity via the rampant case of sequel-itis running wild throughout the development world, but that doesn't mean you can't continue creating your own unique creations with flexible tools such as the popular Garry's Mod.

A new update to Garry's Mod is now available over Steam and will be applied upon restarting Valve's digital distribution service. The update includes fixes such as the shotgun having unintentionally decreased damage, TF2'2 blood overriding Half-Life 2's, and a crash that occurred "when prop's physics object couldn't be created," according to the official Steam website.

Several months ago, PC processor maker Intel purchased the game physics development software company Havok, which is used in a ton of PC and console games. In February the company announced that it would release the PC version of the Havok tool set for free for anyone to use for non-commercial uses. Well, today is the day to download those files.

The files contain both the Havok Physics and Havok Animation tools and can only be used for independent game developers along with academic uses and "enthusiasts". The files do not include Havok's other products such as Havok Cloth and Havok Destruction. The company feels this new release "will boost creative game development throughout the industry."

Indie-built sidescroller Halo Zero was a big hit with PC gamers when it released in 2005, years later new independent Halo titles are jumping into the spotlight.

Halo-Battle, a French php-based strategy game set in the Halo universe, has recently launched online. Players, who may choose to fight for humanity or the alien Covenant, are tasked with resource gathering via mining facilities, building labs to research further technology, developing an army to do battle with the opposition and nearly everything else standard in RTS titles.

Beating Ensemble Studios to the punch with the RTS Halo-Battle, the game is available for free after registering a user name. We have yet to see it in action because of frequent site crashes, probably due to the popularity of the release. Keep in mine the entire site is French so it may be hard to navigate; a translation is apparently in the works.

Also released recently is the public beta for Halo Zero 2, which adds more weapons and better enemy A.I. than the original 2005 title.

Download Halo Zero from Big Download now!

[via 7th Columnist]

Within A Deep Forest was a deeply affecting, strangely lonely platformer where you bounced around a ball that could change its physical properties. In much the same vein, Crazy Bound 2 has been released to fuel the need to bounce spherical objects around a lifeless environment. Featuring the same platforming-action-puzzle gameplay that made Within A Deep Forest so entertaining, it is similar without being exactly the same. And more of a good thing is excellent, right?

[Via IndieGames]

Geometry Wars was a huge hit. Initially released on Xbox Live, it then shifted over to the PC through the use of the excellent Steam service. It has inspired countless clones, many of which are amazing games in their own rights. Well, a new clone can now be counted among them, now that OUEO has released their arena shooter Debrysis.

More of a game that is inspired by Geometry Wars rather than copying it exactly, Debrysis is a fun little arena shooter that is great for killing time in small chunks. It has radar, power-ups, and most important of all, explosions in great quantities. The download is minimal, so give it a whirl and tell us what you think!

[Via IndieGames]

Jack Thompson would be so ashamed at the sort of violence that is being perpetrated recently. First Fantastic Blood Boy, and now this?! Beltality is a small, quirky game where you control presses with one of two goal: squish people (in showers of square blood, no less!) or assemble robots. It's an amazingly simple game, and a good time waster. There are also leaderboards, for those obsessives who have to show their awesome high scores to their friends.

[Via IndieGames]

Welcome to Freeware Friday, a weekly column showcasing excellent games that you can play free of charge!

No self-respecting freeware gamer can talk about freeware games without mentioning one of the masterpieces. It's a simple and yet absurdly good platformer/shooter, developed by one Japanese man over the course of 5 years. It's quite possibly the best freeware game of all time. I am, of course, talking about Cave Story (Or Doukutsu Monogatari for those who want the Japanese name) by Pixel.

Paradroid was an excellent, if mostly overlooked, action-puzzler for the Commodore 64. There have been countless remakes, including a very good freeware one (Freedroid). Now Puppygames have decided to toss their hat into the ring with the indie title Droid Assault, and they have done a fine job.

Sharing the same sort of gameplay as Paradroid, you must capture other droids to do your dirty work for you in Droid Assault. However, where Paradroid has a little mini-game to spice things up, it's merely a button press in Droid Assault. The graphics are a huge improvement, the gameplay excellent, and it's overall a well-designed and executed indie game. You can download the demo or buy it for $10 at Puppygames' site.