Zeno-Clash posts

There's just a couple of days left before Steam ends its massive annual holiday sale event. Remember that nearly every game is on sale on the download site to some degree and that even more savings can be found with special publisher bundles. From now until 1 pm Sunday you can get the following PC games with even deeper price cuts.

Company of Heroes series - Save 75 percent off all games in series
Football Manager 2011 - $26.79
Zeno Clash - $3.75
Medal of Honor - $29.99
Swarm Arena - $2.50
Divinity II The Dragon Knight Saga - $19.99
Half-Life series - Save 75 percent off all games in series or 85 percent if you own Left 4 Dead 1 or Left 4 Dead 2.
The Settlers 7 - $24.99
AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! - A Reckless Disregard for Gravity - $2.50
Bionic Commando Pack (Bionic Commando/Bionic Commando Rearmed) - $12.49
Mafia 2 - $12.49

There are few original ideas for games. We see a ton of titles that, while well made, go over the same stuff over and over again. And then there's ACE Team. The Chile-based development studio made a huge splash in 2009 with the release of Zeno Clash, a unique mix of first person shooter and melee fighting in a strange fictional world that looked unlike any game we had seen before or since.

But ACE Team isn't done with surprising us yet. At E3 2010 the developer revealed its next game Rock of Ages, a unique blend of action (rolling a boulder down hills) strategy (defensive units set up to stop the boulder before it hits a castle) and historical art styles (five art styles from Earth's past), all in a mix of Monty Python-like animation visuals. The game is due out in 2011 via download from publisher Atlus and in one of the first interviews about the game Big Download got ACE Team's co-founder Andres Bordeu to give us more info about Rock of Ages including what the game was previously called.

Last year developer ACE Team announced that it planned to create Zeno Clash 2, a sequel to their acclaimed downloadable first person action game. Since the announcement was made there's been no word on the game's progress. At E3 2010 it was announced that ACE Team was working on an all new game, Rock of Ages, but there was no word on the status of Zeno Clash 2.

In an upcoming interview with Big Download about Rock of Ages, ACE Team's Andres Bordeu was asked about Zeno Clash 2. He replied, "The majority of our efforts are being focused on Rock of Ages, though we are working on another project which we are keeping under cover for now." When we ask for some clarification on Zeno Clash 2's status outside of the interview, Bordeu told us, "I can't elaborate much on this subject for the moment. All I can say is that we have developed some content for the sequel, but at this point the studio has decided to focus on developing new games/IPs, thus Rock of Ages is our main priority. And yes, we are working on another game concept which is not Zeno Clash 2. We're a small studio so there is only so much we can work on simultaneously."

Look for the Rock of Ages interview with Bordeu to be posted later today on Big Download.

It's Saturday afternoon which means that some more games are getting deep price cuts for one day on the Steam PC game download service. These prices will be in effect until 1 pm Eastern time on Sunday. Don't forget that there are a ton of other games with price cuts that will stay in effect until July 4: Here's the full list:

• AudioSurt - $2.50
• Zeno Clash - $3.75
• Supreme Commander 2 - $7.47
• City of Heroes Architect Edition - $9.99
• Left 4 Dead 2 - $10.20
• Company of Heroes Complete Pack (all three games in one bundle) - $24.99
• All Hearts of Iron Games (complete games and expansions) - 50-66 percent off

You never know when or where info about a new game will be revealed. When Big Download got our E3 2010 media badges at the Los Angeles Convention Center this morning there was an ad in the badge holder promoting Rock of Ages, the new game from Zeno Clash developer ACE Team that was announced last week with the title and nothing else.

The badge holder states the game will let players "unleashed a giant boulder and smash through levels inspired by the great eras of art history." In other words this game looks like it will be as cool and weird as Zeno Clash was. It looks like there will also be an online componant as well. The game is due out from publisher Atlus in 2011 via download. You can bet we will get more info on this game later this week at E3.

2009's release of developer ACE Team's weird first person shooter Zeno Clash was one of the highlights of the PC indie scene last year. While the team has already said it's working on a Zeno Clash sequel it looks like the next game to be released from the team will be something totally different.

In its E3 2010 game line-up Atlus revealed it would publish Rock of Ages from ACE Team. There's still no word on what kind of a game it will be or when it will be coming out but we are going to take a shot in the dark and predict it will not be a game adaptation of the recent Broadway 80s's hard rock-themed musical.

[Via Joystiq]

Last October, Tripwire Interactive announced plans to take the acclaimed downloadable action game Zeno Clash to retail stores. Now Tripwire has announced that the boxed copy of the game from developer ACE Team is finally shipping to stores.

The retail version contains all of the content from the downloadable game that folks can purchase on Steam. That includes all of the extra challenge levels that ACE Team released after the original game came out. ACE Team has already announced plans to develop a sequel to the game. Meanwhile they are working on an Xbox 360 port, Zeno Clash Ultimate Edition, that will be made available for that game console in late March.

This year has been a tremendous year for the growth of the indie scene. Many freeware and commercial indie games have seen the light of day, and thanks to the efforts of publishers such as Meridian4 and platforms such as Impulse or Steam, these indie games are getting more and more exposure to a broad audience. We think it's only appropriate that, after last year, we continue the tradition of naming our favorite indie games of the past year. We had to cut the list down to ten, and while this doesn't necessarily represent all of our favorites (that's practically every indie game!), it serves as a good cross-section. If you're looking for some excellent indie games to get yourself started on the treasure trove that was 2009, look no further than these games right here.

A year has gone by, and we find ourselves once again looking at our family and wondering just what to get them for Christmas. While you can certainly get them such stellar titles as Dawn of War 2, you may want to shift your focus to some cheaper and more interesting games. For the price of three indie games, you can get one triple AAA title, and many of these games exceed the games put out by major studios. Excellent gameplay at a third of the price always sounds like a deal to us, and with massive sales going on in the spirit of Christmas, the deal is even sweeter. We have 15 indie games that we think you or someone you love will absolutely adore this holiday season, and most of them run around or under a $20 price tag. Take a glimpse at some of these titles, and see if you want to go back to the big budgets of more mainstream games. After all, every year indie gaming only gets better.

ACE Team's wonderfully weird action game Zeno Clash was one of our favorite downloadable titles for 2009 and now the development team has offered up the game's soundtrack for anyone to listen to. The sountrack is now available on iTunes to download for $9.99. You can also purchase the soundtrack via other outlets such as CDBaby.com.

The soundtrack album contains re-mixes of the game's songs by its original composer Patricio Meneses, all of them remastered for the new release. The album has a total of 18 tracks but you can download three of them, including the game's main theme, for free via the official Zeno Clash blog site.