Left 4 Dead: Live 4 Minutes

Prepare to get your ass kicked ... and love every minute of it.

IGN has a hands-on preview of the new "survival mode" for L4D, coming soon to a zombie clusterf#*%k near you. The mechanics are simple: gear up, alert the horde, and hammer down. Of course, "simple" doesn't mean "easy":

How furious is it? Consider this: In all of the play testing that the Valve designers have done while creating this mode, none of them have ever survived past the 10 minute mark. We're told the company best so far was about nine minutes, with a team of elite players battling like crazy to keep one another alive. Our experience at Valve averaged around three or four minutes a round, but they're like the fastest three or four minutes of your life.

And you're not dealing with just one or two special infected at a time:

What makes it so challenging is that the Survival mode doesn't waste time building up. After the initial wave of zombies you'll start getting hit by waves of special zombies; these are the hunters, smokers, boomers, and tanks. You'll get multiples of them at a time; I often saw two or three hunters or smokers leaping around the battle while the mindless horde minions were everywhere. In one battle, we had the tank, a boomer, a couple of smokers, and a hunter hitting us at the same time. We're told it's even possible to get two tanks at the same time, a prospect that seems both ludicrously unfair and hilarious at the same time.

The mode will be available on 16 maps, one of which is an entirely new level called Lighthouse. In addition, the Dead Air and Death Toll campaigns have been tweaked to accommodate versus mode, to double your griefing pleasure.

Now would be a good time to practice staying in formation.

Facebook infested with worms

From Yahoo! News:

Facebook has seen five different security threats in the past week. According to Trend Micro, four new hoax applications are attempting to trick members into divulging their usernames and passwords. And a new variant of the Koobface worm is running wild on the site, installing malware on the computers of victims who click on a link to a fake YouTube video.

The Koobface worm is dangerous. It can be dropped by other malware and downloaded unknowingly by a user when visiting malicious Web sites, Trend Micro reports. When attackers execute the malware, it searches for cookies created by online social networks. The latest variant is targeting Facebook, but earlier variants have also plagued MySpace.

Once Koobface finds the social-networking cookies, it makes a DNS query to check IP addresses that correspond to remote domains. Trend Micro explains that those servers can send and receive information about the affected machine. Once connected, the malicious user can remotely perform commands on the victim's machine.

"Once cookies related to the monitored social-networking Web sites are located, it connects to these Web sites using the user log-in session stored in the cookies. It then navigates through pages to search for the user's friends. If a friend has been located, it sends an HTTP POST request to the server," Trend Micro reports.

Ultimately, the worm's agenda is to transform the victim's computer into a zombie and form botnets for malicious purposes. Koobface attempts to do this by composing a message and sending it to the user's friends. The message contains a link to a Web site where a copy of the worm can be downloaded by unsuspecting friends. And the cycle repeats itself.

FULL ARTICLE

Hidden within the image...

Find Luke Skywalker in this picture:

UK govt links games to "early death"

From gamesindustry.biz:

The UK government's Department of Health has launched an incredible attack on the videogames industry with an advertisement linking the playing of videogames to an "early death".

The poster, also backed by charities including The British Heart Foundation, Cancer Research and Diabetes UK, shows an image of a child sitting on the floor holding a PlayStation controller in one hand, accompanied by the slogan: "Risk an early death, just do nothing."

The Change4Life campaign, which also features a second, similar advertisement with another child about to eat a cake, is aimed at promoting physical exercise in children, but the clear and public connotations will be unwelcome, to say the least, to an industry working hard to overcome unfounded stereotypes.

The government's own Byron Review last year noted that there was no solid evidence to link obesity to videogames, while the high profile launch and subsequent stellar sales of Nintendo's Wii Fit points towards an increasing trend of more active videogames on offer.

It's only a matter of time before the stink of this propaganda wafts over to the US. It's just not enough these days to promote any ideology on its own merits. The ideologue must also construct an enemy, define it as the aggressor, and march to war.

Team Fortress 2 update

Updates to Team Fortress 2 have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The specific changes include:

Gameplay changes
* Added a duck timer that prevents duck spamming while running around on-ground
* In-air, players are only allowed to duck once before they touch ground again
* Fixed several bounding box issues with jumping, falling, and rocket jump air-walking. Bounding box should be much more accurate there now
* Increased backstab check so that Spies can side-stab again
* When disguising, Spies now always start showing the primary weapon in their disguise, and can then switch it with the last-disguise key

TF2 Fixes

* Fixed flamethrower loophole that resulted in the flame effect being stuck on while the flamethrower wasn't really firing
* Fixed exploit that allowed players to circumvent the force-fire timeout on the pipebomb launcher
* Fixed a bug that caused Natasha's slow on hit effect to be inverted from 75% to 25%
* Restored sawmill_logs.mdl file, fixing some user maps that used it
* Fixed some localization issues with Scout achievement strings
* Removed the "Final" phrasing in the map loading screen

Engine fixes

* Fixed a server crash on startup under Linux
* Fixed a buffer overflow issue related to network string tables
* Gamestats uploading is now done asynchronously. This fixes the client timeout issues on map changes

CP_Junction

* Fixed an exploit where engineers could build a teleporter exit in an invalid area
* Fixed a few bad overlay assignments and other minor issues

Unreal Tournament 3: (massive) patch 2.0

Weighing-in at 309.42 MB, the patch - with the Titan Pack - is available on Fileshack (and elsewhere, I assume). A full description is available here.

If you don't have the game, you can play the full game with the patch for free this weekend through Steam, or you can grab everything for 12 bucks.

Warhammer Online: free 10-day trial

Sign up here.

Metacritic data used to rank publishers - some will be pissed

From gamesindustry.biz:

A new survey of Metacritic data published yesterday has identified the most consistent, and least consistent videogame publishers, according to the scores that their games receive, placing Rockstar Games at the top of the list and Ubisoft at the bottom.

The findings, from research conducted by GameQuarry and highlighted in David Perry's blog, assign a points value to each scoring bracket in the Metacritic system, with 2 points awarded for a game in the 90-100 bracket, 1 point for an 80-89 score, no points for 70-79, -1 point for 60-69 and -2 points for anything scoring a Metacritic average of 59 or below.

The results saw the Grand Theft Auto publisher score a total of 19 points from 23 titles, closely followed by TellTale Games with 14 points from 23 titles and Blizzard with 11 points from 7 titles.

By comparison Ubisoft ranked bottom with -148 points from a total of 237 games, while Activision fared little better on -138 points from 227 games and THQ sat just above them both on 120 points from 150 games.

Ubisoft's low score is the result of 75 titles which were rated at a Metacritic average of 59 or less, compared with just 4 that managed a score of 90 or above.

"Using this method, publishers who may have created stellar titles, would also be penalised for each low scoring game and given no credit for average games," wrote the report's authors, adding that the findings only reflect historical data, and don't necessarily indicate current trends.

"It is imperative to keep these results in perspective as they do not reflect trends towards an increase or decrease in quality trends. For example, a publisher on the Most Consistent List may in fact be trending towards a decline in quality whereas a publisher on the Least Consistent List may trend towards an increase in quality.

"It is also entirely plausible that the publisher noted, may be a standout leader in a particular genre or platform but performing poorly in another. These variations and possible trends are not presented as it was not inclusive of the requested scope."

In his blog Perry suggests that the research findings add an interesting angle to the debate over the use of Metacritic data in the industry: "This is based on Metacritic data, and let's just say many of my friends are having a VERY heavy discussion (right now), on the validity of the Metacritic data. (So this is incredibly timely and will add fuel to that fire for certain!)"

Games for stoners - Aion: The Tower of Eternity

If you're one of the tens of millions that spend all your free time playing MMORPG's instead of having sex, NC Soft is working on yet another fantasy world in which to pimp your social disabilities. Due on October 30, the hype-machine describes it thusly:

Aion: The Tower of Eternity is a visually stunning massively multiplayer online role-playing game featuring cutting-edge imagery, breath-taking environments, and a unique world of fantasy. You play a pivotal role in the fate of Atreia, where flying takes on a completely new role and the enemy is not only the other player faction, but a deadly ancient evil as well.

Ah. A Deadly Ancient Evil. Thank the Four Fiends I've never played a Final Fantasy game, or that would sound really trite.

Here's the pretty video:

Bioshock 2 website launched

2K Games has thrown up a fairly ambiguous website - somethinginthesea.com - for the upcoming Bioshock 2. There's not much in the way of content right now, and no indication (for now) whether the new game will be a sequel or a prequel.

Updates Extravaganza

Windows Vista Service Pack 2 Release Candidate - MS provides a list of "notable changes" here. The download still claims to be a beta, but it is, in fact, a bona fide RC. The final version is due in June.

SoundBlaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio beta driver 1.04.0079 - provides additional support for the X-Fi Xtreme Audio series sound cards for Windows 7 Beta.

AVG Anti-Virus Free 8.5 - apparently, you can't get the update through the regular updater, so you should uninstall the old version first.

Nvidia Forceware 182.08 driver - for XP and Vista; WHQL certified. The drivers are for the GeForce 6, 7, 8, 9 and 200, and the new GeForce GTS 250 GPU's. The package adds SLI support for some newer games, and includes the 9.09.0203 PhysX drivers along with some other fixes.

Call of Duty: World at War patch 1.3 - fixes a lot of shit that shouldn't have been broken in the first place, and also fixes the sound issue with Vista that arrived with patch 1.2. You must have the 1.2 patch to install the 1.3 patch.

Tom Clancy's HAWX demo available

Ubisoft has released a PC demo for Tom Clancy's HAWX (High-Altitude Warfare). You get two missions, two game modes, and co-op support for up to four players. The game is scheduled to be released for the PC on March 13.

You can watch the trailer here.

FILEFRONT DOWNLOAD

The Best Selling PC Games - week ending Feb 21

Another week, another NPD chart detailing the best selling PC games in the USA for the week ending February 21. That week saw the debut of Dawn of War II, along with the surprise return of Crysis Warhead. I should mention that the NPD doesn't track sales by digital distribution, and DoW2 is a native Steam game. That makes the fact that it beat Lich King even more surprising.

1. Warhammer 40,000: Dawn Of War II
2. World Of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King
3. The Sims 2 Double Deluxe
4. The Sims 2 Deluxe
5. Spore
6. World Of Warcraft: Battle Chest
7. World Of Warcraft
8. F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin
9. The Sims 2 Apartment Life Expansion Pack
10. Crysis: Warhead

SOURCE: GAMEGURU

I was not at all surprised that Call of Duty: World at War dropped out of the top ten. While L4D is probably destined to have a smaller, but intensely-loyal following (as is the case with most Valve games), Activision and Treyarch have squandered a good amount of the brand loyalty that grew up around the CoD series for the PC.

The Word, it seems, is out: World at War is flawed in a lot of important ways, and most of those flaws are likely to persist. It's just not worth buying when there are so many competent competitors.

Prosecution closes in Pirate Bay case

From ArsTechnica:

The Pirate Bay trial (mercifully) began its wrap-up today, with closing statements from prosecutor Hakan Roswall and the entertainment industry lawyers who are simultaneously pressing their cases. Roswall spent his time recapping the case, and then asked the court to toss the defendants in a jail cell for one year—down from the two-year maximum that could have been requested.

...

[Movie industry lawyer Monique] Wadsted also claimed that The Pirate Bay was built for piracy, and she noted that site admins do in fact police the site for child pornography, inactive torrents, and misleading descriptions. Given that sort of control over the material, is it credible simply to see The Pirate Bay as a hand-off forum that allows all sorts of user postings for which it cannot be held liable?

The defense is continuing to claim that the European Union e-commerce directive passed in 2000 protects them from liability. The relevant part of the directive is Article 12, the "mere conduit" section, which says that a "service provider" is not liable for the information transmitted by its users.

The rule applies only to "service providers," raising the question of whether The Pirate Bay qualifies, and it only applies when three conditions are met: the service provider must not 1) initiate the transfer, 2) select the receiver of the transfer, 3) modify the transfer in any way.

FULL STORY

Nvidia Beta Forceware driver: 181.71

Nvidia have released the beta Forceware 181.71 driver for Windows 7 Beta. These drivers are for the GeForce 6, 7, 8, 9 and 200 series GPU's.

Fallout 3 - 1.4.06 Patch

Today a new update (v1.4.0.6) is available on Xbox LIVE and Games for Windows LIVEUpdate 1.4 Notes (PC and Xbox 360).

It's a small update in preparation for the game's second DLC, The Pitt, which is slated for release this month.

New Features

* New achievements for The Pitt
* Support for multiple downloadable content


SOURCE: BETHESDA

Commandments of Co-op: Follow these rules or get out of my Left 4 Dead server

Rules I need to follow from Norman Chan, PC Gamer US

1. Know the Map
It’s your responsibility to familiarize yourself with the level layout before joining any server with experienced players. This means not only knowing the right path through the map, but also where to expect weapon, health, and ammo drops, suitable defense positions for every area, and the location of “hot spots” where you can expect to be attacked. Left 4 Dead’s environments are mostly linear with optimal routes, but there are several alternate pathways that you’ll have to switch to on the fly in case you run into a tank or witch. Your team should also come up with standardized nicknames for area landmarks to avoid miscommunication.

2. Assign a team leader
Before the round begins, the team should designate one player to be the party leader, and agree to follow his or her directions for the duration of the campaign. Succumbing to the temptation of venturing off as a lone wolf is the easiest way to fail, so if you don’t like following orders, learn to adequately give them. The leader should always be at the front of the pack to navigate the team as a whole, letting the other players know when to pause for a zombie horde rush or the direction of immediate danger.

3. Be aware at all Times
Sound is your most important sense in Left 4 Dead. Pay close attention to the game’s music and thousands of dynamic sound effects, which help indicate the location of nearby threats. Being aware of your situation also isn’t limited to knowing where enemies are in the map; it means knowing the overall strength of your teammates (health, ammo, and items) and when you’re likely to be attacked. In Versus mode, for example, you should have an idea of how long it’s been since you’ve killed a Boss Infected, so you can take advantage of enemy respawn times to scurry away from locations that leave you vulnerable for harassment.


The diamond formation, like its namesake, is the toughest structure to break

4. Stay in formation
The best four-player formation: a diamond. The team leader sits at the front, crouched and always looking ahead. Two players also crouch-walk at his side, watching the left and right flanks for infected rushes. The last player stands tall and watches the backs of the other three players, calling out if a Smoker tries to pick him off. In games where one player is the obvious weak link, the formation should be rearranged to keep the weak player at the center of the pack, safe from Hunter pounces. In moments of chaos when the team is separated, use the buddy system and stay in pairs until the entire team can be reunited.

5. Don’t let newbies use the shotgun
Keep these powerful but inaccurate toys in experienced hands. You don’t want to fall victim to a friendly-fire “accident.” Just ask Harry Wittington.

The Last Remnant demo: a review (of sorts)

I found another gaming blog called First Person Shouter that's been rather worth-reading. The game Mr. Blogger reviews interests me not at all, but the review has this priceless line, and video evidence:

Luckily, things start making sense soon after the battle, when I touch a stone and a magical goblin pops out of my butt, gives me a blowjob, hands me some weed, and vanishes up my nose.