rage posts

Tomorrow we will have an important announcement concerning the future of Big Download. Stay tuned.

• Steam has released a new automatic patch for Portal 2 that's has a number of bug fixes and improvements.
• As promised the fourth episode of Telltale's Back to the Future game series has been announced.
• The family oriented super hero MMO Marvel Super Heroes Squad Online has officially launched.
• It looks like we will get a reveal of the next Assassin's Creed game soon via its official Facebook page.
• Will you be in Plano, Texas on May 7? Then you might be able to check out a demo of Rage.

Remember when game trailers used to be just a minute or two in length? Now it seems the trend is for extra long trailers with lots of time to show off snippets of games. Today we get a 10 + minute trailer of Rage (the game, not the emotion) showing off a extended sequence from id Software's upcoming post apocalypse shooter.

The trailer show a section of the game called Dead City which you must explore while avoid being killed by the various mutants that inhabit the area. The trailer shows off id's next generation graphic engine, id tech 5, in style. Rage is still due for release on September 13.

Download the Rage Dead City trailer at Big Download

Rage is the latest game that will be getting some kind of pre-order special edition. VG247.com reports that id Software's next first person shooter will be getting an Anarchy Edition when it is released to store on September 13. That edition of the game will include some special in-game items such as a double-barrel shotgun, a rat-rod buggy, crimson elite armor and something called "fists of Rage". Everyone who has already pre-ordered the game will be upgraded to the Anarchy Edition automatically. At the moment the edition is only scheduled for a US release.

Both regular and Anarchy Edition will also get a mission pack called Wasteland Sewers where you have to go underground to deal with mutants in a tunnel system.

More details of Rage's multiplayer modes were also revealed. One is called Legends of the Wasteland, a two-player co-op mode where you and a friend go on missions based on the game's single player levels. The other is called Rage Combat Rally, which will allow competitive and team based gameplay for up to six players.

While Rage may not be the typical corridor shooter that id Software is known for in the part, that doesn't mean that the game won't have a ton of weapons for players to use. GameTrailers.com has posted up a new Rage gameplay trailer that shows off some of those weapons in action. You can check out the trailer after the jump.

You have your typical weapons of destruction to choose from; the pistol, the machine gun, the shotgun. The art design for each weapon, however, is pretty unique looking. There are also some more unusual weapons in the game such as the automatic turret; perfect for times when you have hordes of mutants charging you but all you want is to drink another beer.

Another day has ended. A new day is about to begin. Have you upgraded your PC lately? How about your graphics drivers?

• Rage's single player campaign could be about 15 hours in length.
• Steam has a new automatic update available for Crasher.
• The 2011 edition of the official Blood Bowl World Cup competition is taking sign ups.
• The ad campaigns for Battlefield 3 and the next Call of Duty game could be pretty massive.
• The lesson for today is don't mess with Valve.
• Voting for the Smithsonian's Art of Video Games exhibit will end on April 17.

Another week is about to end. What will the next week bring us? Lots of stuff about owls, we suspect ... or maybe not:

• The man who helped to create the first versions of Madden NFL for the Apple II, Commodore 64 and MS DOS now claims Electronic Arts owes him a lot of money.
• The newest edition of the official Bethesda Softworks podcast celebrates the 5th anniversary of The Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion.
• Will the next Resident Evil movie actually be a prequel to the last four flicks?
• Check out a preview of the Rage comic book series.

Just a couple of weeks before Rage is released you will be able to check out an adaptation of id Software's next first person shooter in convenient prose form. Publisher Bethesda Softworks announced that a novel version of the post-apocalyptic game will be released via Del Rey on August 30. The game itself is due out on September 13.

The novel goes deeper into the storyline for Rage and is being written by Matt Costello who is a long time collaborator with id on the third Doom game and also on Rage. Costello has previously written two novels based on the storyline for Doom 3.

Dark Horse Comics has already released two mini-series based on BioWare's Mass Effect RPG series and it looks like more are coming. Newsarama reports from this weekend's C2E2 comic book convention Dark Horse Comics reps have confirmed that a third Mass Effect comic book mini-series is due out later this year.

Details about the mini-series have yet to be revealed but since Mass Effect 3 is due out late in 2011 its likely that the comic could tie into the storyline for that game. During the panel Dark Horse reps said they would like to do even more game-based comics including perhaps some Dragon Age comics (rival IDW released a Dragon Age mini-series last year)

The DirectX graphics API created by Microsoft is used by nearly all PC game developers. The one big exception is id Software. Its main programmer John Carmack has used the OpenGL graphics API to help program all of id's 3D graphics engines including id Tech 5 which is the basis for id's upcoming shooter Rage.

While Carmack has been critical of DirectX in the past that has now changed. In an article at bit-tech.net (based on an interview Carmack gave to the Custom PC print mag) he states, "I actually think that Direct3D is a rather better API today." He added that while DirectX has improved over the years, OpenGL "has been held back by compatibility concerns."

So does that mean that Carmack will switch to DirectX? Maybe not. He states, "OpenGL still works fine and we wouldn't get any huge benefits by making the switch, so I can't work up much enthusiasm for cleaning it out of our codebase."

Rage has become the latest game to get a comic book adaptation. Bethesda Softworks sent over word today that id Software's upcoming post-apocalyptic shooter will have a three issue mini-series from Dark Horse Comics with the first issue due out in June.

Written by comic book veteran Arvid Nelson, the storyline will be set before the events of the game's story with a female scientist learning that she's being lied to about what really happened to Earth after she is revived from an Ark. The mini-series will be drawn by Andrea Mutti with cover artwork by Glenn Fabry.

In related news, the Rage web site has got some new content including a free MP3 download of Burning Jacob's Ladder by Mark Lanegan. The song was featured in the latest Rage gameplay trailer.

[Via email press release]