freedom-force posts

Irrational Games may be making titles for multiple platforms nowadays but when the game developer started it was a PC game only creative team (System Shock 2, the Freedom Force games and others). And as far as its founder Ken Levine feels,"... when it comes down to it, as a gamer, I'm a PC." In a guest post on Kotaku, Levine talks about his continued fondness for playing games on the PC, stating, " ... I like the ergonomics of the thing, the mouse and keyboard, the effortless transition from gaming to browsing to typing. I'm an alt-tab kind of guy."

While the column was supposed to be about Levine's views on the future of PC gaming, he admits, " F*** if I know." But he does say that PC gaming " ... will always be the place that drives innovation." He adds, "If you want to know the future of gaming, buy a PC. And pay attention. Because above all, that thing on your desk is a crystal ball."

If Steam can do a big summer sale, why can't GamersGate? The PC game download site has just launched a month long summer sale of various titles, with each week focusing on a game genre. For the first week of the sale, the site is cutting prices on a number of role-playing games.

Among the deals you can get this week are the first two Deus Ex titles which can be purchased and downloaded for just $3.39 each. All of the Gothic games are on sale this week for between 50 and 75 percent off their normal prices. Other games on sale this week include The Witcher for $6.78, Mount and Blade for $10.78, its expansion Mount and Blade Warband for $20.06, and Freedom Force Versus the Third Reich for a mere $1.34.

A while back Irrational Games asked people to call in and give their guesses about the next game that the folks behind the original BioShock are working on. Today a new episode of Irrational's official podcast had the best of the fan's guesses (we really liked the Myst Babies for the Nintendo DS guess).

Then the podcast turned serious as the podcast confirmed that a GC trailer for the unannounced game will be shown on Thursday, August 12. That's the day after a planned press event will be held in New York City to reveal the game to the media for the first time. The podcast then talked to a number of Irrational team members about how excited they are that they will soon be able to talk about what they have been working on for the past few years. Stay for the full podcast to here one of the fan's suggestions of a rather ... interesting ... ideal for a game.

It's been nearly three years since the original BioShock was released by developer Irrational Games. Since then Irrational head man Ken Levine and his Boston-based team have been pretty good at keeping their mouths shut about what Irrational's next game will be, other than vague hints that it will be a "shooter title" and that it will be "more ambitious than anything we've ever done. Even more, substantially more ambitious than BioShock."

Well the wait may be close to ending. Our sister site Joystiq got a "save the date" note for some kind of an event on August 11 in New York City. That's all the info we have but it's unlikely that any "save the date" announcement is for a simple employee party. Just a hunch but we think that the reveal of Irrational's next game will be made at the event.

So we didn't get an announcement at E3 2010 on what Irrational Games' next major game project would be like. Bummer all around. But is the developed behind System Shock 2, the Freedom Force games and the first BioShock getting closer to that long awaited reveal?

We have no idea but it seems Irrational wants to hear from all of you about what your guesses might be. The developer's Twitter page has a post asking, "What do you think we are working on? Call and leave a message. Please keep it short. 617-302-7805." Our guess? A first person Freedom Force game where the super hero team has to battle with SHODAN and Andrew Ryan ... oh but with zombies, too. That would be kind of silly but boss at the same time but that's just us.

It's by far one of our favorite game series of all time. Irrational Games' super hero RPG Freedom Force and its sequel Freedom Force Vs The Third Reich takes the Stan Lee-Jack Kirby style of comics and turns them into highly entertaining games.

Now Irrational Games has found a way to combine the Freedom Force series with Valentine's Day with their own printable cad featuring the game's robot-with-a-heart Man-Bot. The artwork was handled by Irrational's Robb Waters who also gets his own new Q&A where he chats about various stuff. You can even see him create the Man-Bot artwork via a time-lapse video on Irrational's web site. And remember, your special someone deserves something like this.

As promised last week, 2K Boston is now officially no more as the development team behind System Shock 2, Freedom Force and the first BioShock game has gone back to using its original moniker of Irrational Games. The revived brand also has a new web site with looks back at the company's games as well as the first installment of a podcast called Irrational Behavior. Let's just say you won't be hearing anything about helicopter games or Casey Johnson in this podcast.

Irrational Games head man Ken Levine has posted up an intro to the revamp saying that the site will be all about "secrets". There will be revelations about past Irrational Games that got cut or didn't work. And what about Irrational's next game? Levine states, "And yes, we will tell you about the game we're working on right now. Just not today."

When BioShock shipped to stores in 2007, the game's developer Irrational Games got a name change to 2K Boston. We and a lot of other folks were not happy that one of the best game development studios in the industry was having its identity superseded by a generic publisher-imposed brand. Now Game Informer has revealed that 2K Boston will soon be no more as the studio will revert back to its Irrational Games brand.

The studio's official web site currently has a countdown clock that will expire on Monday. Once that happens, the name change will become official. The site will also have a number of new community features and insights into the studio's previous games like System Shock 2, the Freedom Force series and of course BioShock. However, there doesn't appear to be any plans to reveal Irrational's next project.

Fallout 3 isn't the only game on sale on Steam this weekend, In fact there's a ton of games that have just been collected into a new game bundle via the download service. 20 titles from 2K Games are now available to purchase as one big game pack for just $59.99. If you bought each game individually it would cost $229.80. Oh, and did we mention that from now until July 7 you can get 10 percent off that already low price, making the bundle $53.99?

Here's the full list of games in the bundle:

Sid Meier's Civilization IV,
Sid Meier's Civilization III Complete
Sid Meier's Pirates!
Shattered Union
Prey
CivCity: Rome
Civilization IV Warlords
Sid Meier's Railroads!
Railroad Tycoon 3
Railroad Tycoon II Platinum
X-COM: Terror From the Deep
X-COM: Apocalypse
BioShock
X-COM: Interceptor
X-COM: UFO Defense
X-COM: Enforcer
Civilization IV: Beyond the Sword
Freedom Force
Freedom Force vs. the Third Reich
Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Colonization.

With the huge success that the New York Comic Con had this past weekend, it's clear that comic books and games have lots of links and a shared audience. We have posted up a feature about comic books that we think should be turned into games but the truth is more and more games are being adapted and expanded in comic book form.

Various publishers have released game-based comics over the years and today in the first part of a two part series Big Download looks at just some of the attempts to turn games into four-color entertainments. Stay tuned as we will have even more examples on Tuesday. Update: The second part of the feature is now up.

Click on the link above to continue reading From Comics to Games: Part 1