Survival horror

Touted by many as a candidate for the greatest game ever made, we've invested several hours in the first portions of Electronic Arts' Spore in our quest to determine if it's really THAT good. So far, it's holding our interest. In the first few hours in playing the single player portion we can say that Spore's creator Will Wright seems to want to cram pretty much every game genre he can think of in one title (except maybe for first person shooters; maybe he just didn't have time).

Starting up Spore brings up the main menu where you have three choices: Play, Create and Share. Share is basically being able to check out other players' creations in Spore and sharing your own. Create opens up all of the game's various editors to allow you to make creatures, buildings, vehicles and space ships without the need to actually go in and play the game at all. We suspect a lot of folks might just ignore the actual game side of Spore and dive into making stuff.

Dead Space's mix of sci-fi and survival horror is apparently too much for some countries to take. According to a report on Destructoid this week, the Electronic Arts titled has been banned for sale in three countries so far; Germany, China and Japan. There's no specific word on why these three territories decided to ban the game but we can have some educated guesses.

It looks like PC owners will also have to wait a little bit for their port of Dead Space to be released as EA announced that the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions will now have a new release date of October 14. The PC version stays where it is with a release date of October 20.

Update: Eurogamer.de reports that Dead Space has not yet been banned in Germany, claiming that the game has yet to go through the country's rating system

Electronic Arts is really pushing the marketing of its upcoming survival horror game Dead Space. This week, details were revealed on one of the side projects for the game; the direct-to-DVD animated prequel that's being handled by Film Roman and Starz Media. The DVD will be released on Oct. 28 by Anchor Bay, a week after the game's release.

The film will be released in both DVD and Blu-Ray formats and High-Def Digest reports that both versions will have deleted scenes and trailers, a digital copy version that can be transferred (legally) to your PC or mobile video device and two exclusive cheat codes for the game. The Blu-Ray version will have additional downloadable animatics from the movie and a Blu-Ray first; an isolated music score that you can download in MP3 format.

From New York to London, the end of the world takes on many looks and shapes. In Legendary, major cities get torn apart by mythological creatures released from Pandora's Box. In this latest video, the game's developers go into detail about what it takes to bring about the end of the world and why it makes for great tourist attractions.

Download the Legendary Behind-the-Scenes HD Video - Episode 4 (510 MB)
Download the Legendary Behind-the-Scenes HD Video - Episode 3 (51 MB)
Download the Legendary Behind-the-Scenes HD Video - Episode 2 (59 MB)
Download the Legendary Behind-the-Scenes HD Video - Episode 1 (141 MB)

This patch fixes Space Siege's problem with recognizing certain DVD drives. Patch must be copied into game directory and run with the disc in drive.

Download the Space Siege DVD Recognition Fix (16 MB)

The Penumbra first person horror action-adventure game series just got an expansion pack. Penumbra: Requiem is now available for download at Gamersgate and Direct2Drive for just $9.99. The expansion from developer Frictional Games requires the installation of Penumbra: Black Plague.

In a note on the Frictional Games web site site, the developers state that this expansion concentrates on the physics puzzles and gameplay more than previous installments. According to the site, "Requiem does its best to deliver a nightmarish and feverish atmosphere. Penumbra: Requiem is an attempt to deliver a fresh and rewarding experience and not just some rehash of previous material." While the expansion is for the moment for the Windows platform Macintosh and Linux users will get their own versions soon, according to the web site.

Electronic Arts has been promoting their upcoming sci-fi survivor horror game Dead Space with things like an Image comic mini-series and an upcoming direct-to-DVD feature. Now comes word that the publisher has launched a new web site, NoKnownSurvivors.com, that is aiming to give away 100 copies of the game.

The Flash-heavy web site shows a decapitated body floating in apparent zero gravity. Clicking on one of the suspended limbs (we won't say which one) sends you into some kind of facility where you are asked to click on a console to take a "Ishimura Aptitude Test" (you need to be registered to EA's web site to proceed). Answering the questions correctly makes your eligible for winning one of the 100 Dead Space game copies. New questions will apparently be posted on the site every Monday.

The latest blood-soaked trailer for Project Origin runs through a patchwork of cinematic and action sequences. Not much new is revealed, but the trailer, which features up-close flashes of monsters and bodies exploding from heavy gunfire, should be watched in the dark.

Download the Project Origin GC08 HD Trailer (32 MB)

Earlier this week we reported that Konami had plans to release a PC version of their upcoming survival horror game Silent Hill: Homecoming in September. At the time we noted that the only place Konami stated the PC version would be released would be via Valve's Steam service with no word on a retail release.

Now comes confirmation (via out sister site Joystiq) that Konami indeed has no plan to ship the PC port of the game to retail stores. According to a statement from the publisher, "Steam is currently the only method of distribution for Silent Hill Homecoming PC." This has to be considered a major coup for Valve's download service and an interesting decision for Konami to bypass retail stores entirely for one of their major franchises.

You can never get enough high-intensity zombie blasting action, but we'll have to settle for watching trailers until Left 4 Dead finally releases. This trailer shows what it takes to take on a rush of zombies clamoring to rip you and your team apart, and the firepower it takes to take out a mutant boss. Left 4 Dead will let players team up as a group of survivors against waves of undead, but real players can also take control of the powerful bosses to wreak havoc. The game is currently scheduled to release this November, so players better learn to play together or die alone.

Download Left 4 Dead HD Gameplay Video (255 MB)

Konami rarely releases PC games but for their upcoming survival horror game Silent Hill: Homecoming they are making a big exception, announcing today that a PC version will be released at the same time as the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions. All three versions are scheduled for release at the same time this September (the European versions are due out this November).

Silent Hill: Homecoming is the latest game in the long running survival horror series as your player character heads back to his hometown of Shepherd's Glen to try to find his missing brother. Naturally you will have to encounter some of the oddest and most frightening creatures ever made for a survival horror series. The PC version will be made available via digital download on Valve's Steam service. There's no word if Konami will release the game to retail stores yet.

Given the name similarity to Dungeon Siege, the fantasy role-playing game created and also developed by Gas Powered Games, one would reasonably led to believe that Space Siege is a sci-fi action RPG set in space. Those people would be wrong. Space Siege is actually a survival horror game that's more closely related to isometric shooters like Shadowgrounds than action RPG's like Diablo. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with the approach, but those looking for the depth of Dungeon Siege in a sci-fi setting need to seriously adjust their expectations. There are some minor RPG-like elements to the game, like modifying some of the character's stats and a skill tree, but not much else beyond them. There are no side quests, there's minimal NPC interaction, and no loot/inventory system outside of the weapons selection. Simply put, the game is a straight-up shooter than happens to look a lot like an RPG.

Warren Ellis is one of the most prolific and most controversial comic book writers around. He has written both mainstream super hero titles as well has his own titles that range from westerns to sci-fi to a very brutal super hero title called Black Summer that starts with a super hero murdering the President.

He's also written for video games in the past and in a recent post on his web site he stated that he helped to contribute to Dead Space, the upcoming survival horror title from Electronic Arts. While he admits his work on the game ended about 18 months ago he does state that "I wrote a bunch of the groundwork, backstory and structure" for the Dead Space storyline. The game itself recently got a six-issue prequel comic from Image Comic but Ellis didn't script it.

Russian publisher 1C Company has announced a deal with GamersGate that allows the digital distribution portal to feature many of 1C's upcoming games, reports IGN. The agreement, which covers 13 titles, spans the third quarter of 2008 through quarter one of 2009.

GamersGate CEO Theodore Bergquist is delighted with the deal, believing that carrying many of 1C's most anticipated and popular titles "will ensure that GamersGate has first dibs on carrying strong titles from their portfolio."

1C Company International Sales Director Nikolay Baryshnikov echoed the sentiment, saying that the deal "is a great opportunity to deliver our games to players all over the world."

Big Download had the opportunity to go hands-on with a number of 1C's titles that will be featured on GamersGate, including Necrovision, Hummer 4x4, Cryostasis: Sleep of Reason, Death Track Resurrection and Men of War.

During a chat with Shacknews during QuakeCon this week, id Software's co-founder John Carmack revealed that id had actually been working on a major new game called Darkness. The title, which would have been considered a survival horror game, sounds a lot like the TV movie Lost with players fighting off creatures on an island after a plane crash.

However id decided to stop work on Darkness after 18 months on production to move onto their current original game Rage. Why? Carmack stated that they felt that the game was repeating aspects of their last major game Doom III that they didn't want to repeat, namely the dark enviroments and "contrived nature of monsters hiding in closets". The generally poor sales of survival horror games also factored into the decision.

This isn't the first time id has stopped production on a game to move onto another title. After Quake III Arena was completed they started working on a game called Quest which would have been a fantasy multiplayer oriented team title. After about six months of development they cancelled the project to work on Doom III.