syndicate posts

Ah, Choplifter. Playing that game brings back a lot of memories. Mostly ones where we are drinking a lot of Coke and eating chips. Good times.

• Steam has new automatic updates for Civilization V and Total War Shogun 2.
• Peter Molyneux says he would like to participate in some way in a Syndicate remake. Are you listening, EA?
• PC Gamer has a new Sword of the Stars II developers diary entry.
• Fox News once again goes after a game with its "fair and balanced" reporting. This time it's Duke Nukem Forever.
• Finally EA's former founder Trip Hawkins is in trouble with the IRS.

Starbreeze Studios, who created its own graphics engines for previous titles like The Darkness and The Chronicles of Riddick game series, is now working with a third party graphics engine for its future projects. The Sweden-based developer announced today a new multi-year deal to use Epic Games' Unreal Engine 3 technology for its future game titles.

So far Starbreeze has yet to reveal what game it is working on next although the developer has been linked via rumor for years as working on a revival of the Syndicate series for publisher Electronic Arts. A previously announced game that would have been an adaptation of the Jason Bourne spy movies and novels was canceled by EA.

It was a fairly slow day for news aside from the surprise Torchlight II announcement. But as we have hinted before it's the calm before the storm begins.

• If you live in Canada you can order a pizza from Pizza Hut and get a chance to win Need For Speed World starter packs.
• More rumors of a new Syndicate game hit the nets. EA should just announce this game already.
• The Mac version of Gratuitous Space Battles is now available.
• Power of Defense is now on Steam for 10 percent off.
• A new Steam patch for Disciples III is now available.
• Impulse has Victoria: Complete on sale for 50 percent off until August 12, the release date of the sequel Victoria 2.

We've reported many times over the past two years on a possible revival of the Syndicate game franchise. Now document hunting web site superannuation has found three official documents from the US Copyright Office that seem to prove that such a game is under development at developer Starbreeze and publisher Electronic Arts.

A new entry in the near future tactical strategy game series, which started in the early 1990s at the now defunct developer Bullfrog, has supposedly been in development at Starbreeze for over two years if earlier rumors are to be believed. If that's true we are hoping that EA will finally admit to this game sometime soon (perhaps at E3).

Electronic Arts continues to shut down game projects with word coming this week that the publisher has canceled one of their two planned games with developer Starbreeze Studios. The Sweden-based company made the announcement themselves on their web site.

The announcement does not state which of the two EA projects was canceled, saying only that the canceled game was still in pre-production. The other still active game project is now in full production, according to Starbreeze, and it does not plan to lay off any of their team members as a result of the other game's shut down. Starbreeze and EA announced in late 2008 that they planned to release a game based on the Jason Bourne spy franchise. There were also unconfirmed rumors that the two were working on a revival of the Syndicate game franchise.

It's a game that many PC gamers fans have wanted to see revived and a new rumor suggests it may actually happen. Gamesindustry.biz is reporting via unnamed sources that Electronic Arts may be publishing a new version of Syndicate, the sci-fi tactical action game that was first released in 1993 via the now defunct Bullfrog Productions.

According to their story, the new Syndicate game is being developed under the code name of Project Redline at developer Starbreeze. The Chronicles of Riddick game developer supposedly has been working on the game since August 2007. However the article states the new Syndicate game is still a long way from completion as Starbreeze is also working with EA on a previously announced game using the Jason Bourne license. EA has not yet officially commented on the report.

On Tuesday we posted up a feature naming 10 classic PC games that we think would be perfect for a revival. The response to the article was extremely positive, so much so that we have decided to quickly post up another installment featuring 10 more PC game titles that are ripe for a comeback.

Among our choices this time are a mob-themed first person shooter, a fantasy RTS, a movie-based space sim and and tactical cyberpunk strategy-action game. Can you guess which games we are talking about before you check out our choices (there's a rather large hint in the image above)?

Click on the image above to read more on 10 more PC games that need a comeback

Shhhhh..want to hear something that's supposed to be a secret? Computer and Video Games claims they have one to tell. In one of their typical "stories from unnamed sources" they are saying that that Electronic Arts is planning to revive one of the classic franchises; the cyberpunk themed tactical strategy series Syndicate.

Computer and Video Games claims that the developer in charge of this new revival of the 1993 PC title is Starbreeze (of Chronicles of Riddick and The Darkness fame) but offers no other details (the original Syndicate was developed by the now defunct Bullfrog). We are a little skeptical, quite frankly, simply because CVG said that Blizzard was definately announcing a Starcraft MMO last year when in fact it was Starcraft II. However, it's a Sunday so set your filters to "speculation" now....