unreal-tournament posts

So we bet a lot of people who see you play action games or first person shooters think you are wasting your time. Not so, according to a new study from the University of Rochester. The study suggests that playing such games can help players with improving "a wide variety of general skills."

The study, to be published in the journal Current Biology, the authors tested " dozens of 18- to 25-year-olds" who apparently don't normally play games. Some of them spent hours playing action games like Call of Duty 2 and Unreal Tournament while others played the decidedly non-action game The Sims 2. After playing the games each group was asked to perform some other tasks and answer some questions. According to the study, the players of the first person shooter games "were up to 25 percent faster" in completing their tasks and correctly answered the questions at the same rate as The Sims 2 players.

The researchers say that by playing first person shooters, players could improve in handling tasks like "multitasking, driving, reading small print, keeping track of friends in a crowd, and navigating around town."

[Via Blue's News. Photo courtesy of University of Rochester]

The world was a very different place back in late 1999. Bill Clinton still had over a year to go in his presidency. This new thing called the "internet" and the "world wide web" was beginning to look less like a trend and more like a real communications tool. Broadband usage was still well below dial-up access.

It was also near the height of the PC game industry. Thanks in part to the growing use of the internet, people were buying desktop PCs at a record rate. PC gaming rigs were getting faster all the time and the use of hardware acceleration in PC games and in graphics cards increased the performance and the looks of many PC game titles to height that were much better than the best console games at the time.

Epic Games has decided to give folks yet another chance to sample their 2007 first person shooter Unreal Tournament 3 for free beginning tomorow on Steam. Folks can download and play the complete version of the game for free until the end of the weekend. In addition the game will also go on sale for 60 percent off its normal Steam price until September 27.

Epic Games will also put the Unreal Deal Pack on sale for 60 percent off during the same time period and the original Unreal Tournament game will be on sale for a mere $1.99 during the sales period. This Thursday marks the 10th anniversary of the release of the demo for Unreal Tournament.

Epic Games hit a gold mine with the Xbox 360 action franchise Gears of War but their flagship Unreal Tournament series didn't get as big a reception with the release of Unreal Tournament 3 in 2007. Fans looking for a new UT game anytime soon may not care for what Epic Games co-founder Tim Sweeney said to G4TV in a new video interview.

Sweeney states, "Unreal Tournament is certainly a major long-term priority but we're planning not to release a major retail game in the series for several years. So we have that effort somewhat on hold while we work on a few other initiatives." He did add that Epic plans to continue to support the creation of third party mods for the game. In fact Sweeney says they will announce plans sometime in the future to " . . . open up the engine to more people to use freely and use cool stuff."

Several weeks ago the GameTap downloadable site announced they would add Epic Games' Unreal franchise to their library. Today Gametap is expected to add both Unreal Gold and Unreal Tournament: Game of the Year edition to its premimum service sometime today.

GameTap's blog site has also revealed that their free game of the week feature finally returns after a several week hiatus. This week Total Overdose will be free to play for one week. Also GameTap has refreshed its regular free library with an all new list. The library includes titles like the original Operation Flashpoint, Commandos 3, Colin Mcrae Rally and BloodRayne. The blog site also has a list of upcoming free and premimum games that will be added to GameTap in the coming week.s

Sometimes you just need to sit down, slide a floppy into your A: drive, and enjoy gaming retro style. We know this all too well! That's why we have a list of the best and brightest from days long gone. These are some of our favorite games of all time, and we're sure that you'll love them as much as we do, if not more. Welcome to Boot Disk, and enjoy the retro ride!

In the late 1990s, there were three big FPS franchises on the scene. There was, of course, the reigning champion Quake, and alongside it were newcomers Half-Life and Unreal. All three franchises were renowned for their ability for users to create modifications, cutting-edge graphics (at the time), and robust multiplayer support. However, in 1999 the Unreal franchise blew the minds of the FPS fan with Unreal Tournament. It quickly became one of the most played multiplayer games of all time and launched the Unreal Tournament franchise, which has been one of the benchmarks of multiplayer FPS gaming for the past 10 years. With the release of Unreal Tournament 3's free expansion, it's a good time to take a look at the game that originated the series.

CD Projekt's DRM-free game download service GOG.com has gotten a lot of attention lately and today the company announced perhaps its biggest addition yet to its line-up of games. Epic Games has signed a deal that will allow a number of its older Unreal games to be made available for purchase and download from GOG.com.

The games include Unreal Gold and Unreal Tournament: Game of the Year Edition both of which are available for download and purchase now for $9.99. In the coming weeks, Unreal II: The Awakening Special Edition and Unreal Tournament 2004: Editor's Choice Edition will also be added to the GoG.com mix

Forget hot coffee, violence and piracy -- lists are perhaps the most controversial topic in the video game industry, especially among readers. Someone's favorite choice always seems to be excluded, and less-than-deserving names often manage to edge out more venerable entries.

That being said, GamePro has assembled what is arguably a competent list of the eight most powerful game studios in the world. Love them or hate them, it's hard to argue the studios that made the list, and thankfully the list is not compiled in any order designating best and worst.

Among the most notable is Epic Games, developers of Unreal Tournament and Gears of War. The growing popularity of Epic, mostly due to console gamers' embrace of the Gears franchise, certainly qualifies their inclusion. Equally important, especially to the PC gaming world, is Blizzard Entertainment. Always a favorite among mouse owners, Blizzard's World of WarCraft launched the company into mainstream culture, a move that is good or bad depending upon whom you ask.

You can check out the full list on GamePro's official website.

Your daily wrap-up of the hottest stories in PC gaming in the last 24 hours.

	In-Depth: GRID GRID sets up a great mood for racing from the moment you set up your profile and put in an audio name. From that point on, the game greets you by name each time you load it up and refers to you personally with race updates. It seems like a minor addition, but it provides a strong sense of engagement with the game world as you build up your racing reputation, rake in the prize money, and race go on racing tours across the USA, Europe and Japan. The PC version sports great performance and fantastic graphics, but it's worthwhile to purchase a gamepad to play this one in order to get the best experience. More after the jump.
	Big Versus: GRID This week in Big Versus we're tackling Codemasters' latest entry in the Race Driver series, GRID, which hits retail for the PC, Xbox 360 and PS3 today. Shying away from its more realistic racers like other TOCA racing games and the recently released Dirt, Codemasters hopes to capture some of the underground scene with their latest arcade style racing title.
	Two very different Alone in the Dark trailers emerge We have two new trailers for Eden Games and Atari's upcoming reboot of the Alone in the Dark franchise. The videos couldn't be more different. One features gameplay footage and commentary by producer Nora Paloni about the various enemies, weapons, and combat strategies in the game. It's a continuation of an earlier video that focused on fire.
	LEGO Indiana Jones now available in stores As of today, you can go out, buy LEGO Indiana Jones, and re-experience the original trilogy, thereby pushing Crystal Skull's awfulness out of your mind. According to a LucasArts press release Big Download received earlier today via email, "LEGO Indiana Jones presents a tongue-in-cheek take on the first three cinematic adventures of pop culture's most iconic archaeologist."
	Unreal Tournament III 1.3 patch details The 1.3 patch for Unreal Tournament III hasn't been released quite yet, but that didn't stop PlanetUnreal from digging for concrete details. Among the substantial list of fixes and additions are numerous bot improvements, several mod-specific collision detection issues, increased Aegia support, and cut/copy/paste functionality for the game's console.
	Fallout 3 Collector's Edition finally visualized We have reported in the past on Bethesda Softworks' plans to release a collector's edition of their highly anticipated RPG Fallout 3 but today the developer's official blog site has finally given us a visual of what that special edition of the game will actually look like. As promised the Collector's Edition will be housed in a metal Vault TEC lunch box with some great looking artwork (we would love to see the reaction if a kid took that lunch box to school).

Eurogamer's Kristan Reed followed up on Epic Games' recent flurry of XBox 360 Unreal Tournament 3 announcements by speaking with VP Mark Rein yesterday. They covered a wide variety of Epic-related topics. Not the least of those: speculation about a third single-player title in the Unreal franchise.

"I'm sure that at some point in our future we will make another single-player, story-driven Unreal game," said Rein. "I'm sure at some point there will be one. There are no plans to do one today." So it's coming, but not any time soon! Other info from the interview: there are no specific plans to release the 360 exclusive content on the PC but "who knows," more downloadable content is on the way, Epic is working on new IPs, and Gears of War 2 is (of course) going to be awesome.

The rest of the interview covered subjects related exclusively to the Epic's console work.