Front Mission Evolved is the next chapter in the series, and as you probably know by now, the new game will be a third-person shooter–a change of pace from the hybrid strategy role-playing gameplay we’ve previously seen from the Front Mission games. You play as Dylan Ramsey, a young engineer and pilot of a wanzer–Front Mission’s giant, gun-toting mechs. Over the course of the game, Ramsey gets embroiled in the war between the United Continental States, which the young robot jockey joins, and the mysterious Sword of Damocles (SOD) faction. Over the course of the game, Ramsey will not only unlock his potential as a pilot, but will also discover the secret of “edge,” a hidden wanzer power that, when fully charged, slows time and doubles Ramsey’s damage output.

Our session included a hands-off demonstration of three single-player missions followed by a brief hands-on with the game’s multiplayer. We’ll cover the single-player missions first. Evolved offers a mission-based single-player adventure that chronicles Ramsey’s journeys both in a wanzer and out of one (the game has a handful of on-foot missions that play like more of a conventional third-person shooter), though fortunately for the young soldier, more often than not he’ll be accompanied by one or more computer-controlled allies who will provide backup fire while you scramble out of harm’s way to replenish your vehicle’s shields. Wanzers have four primary body locations–shoulders, left arm, right arm, and legs (the first three can be mounted with separate weapons, and the fourth helps determine your wanzer’s armor and speed levels)–and damaged body parts slowly recover from damage when you can duck into cover, similar to the way shields work in the Halo games.

You’ll pilot a wanzer into battle in Front Mission Evolved’s campaign, but you won’t be alone.

The first mission we saw took place about three hours into the campaign, in and around Fort Monus, a tropical region and one of the game’s five primary environments (which also include the Antarctic, outer space, and futuristic New York in two different states–before and after the devastation of war). In this first mission, Ramsey piloted an experimental “Zephyr” wanzer, equipped for fast speed with a machine gun in its right hand, melee attacks equipped in its left, and missile pods on its shoulders. This mission required him to weave in and out of enemy fire as he and his computer-controlled teammates, Adela and Russell, charged forward into a military installation where four decommissioned wanzers lay in wait.

In this mission, Ramsey took on several different kinds of enemy wanzers, including brawlers, which get up-close and personal, and ballistic wanzers, which are equipped with heavy-duty rocket launchers. Fortunately, Evolved gives you more than just your weapons to play with; not only can your wanzer perform a standard dashing attack, but it also has a constantly recharging energy meter that lets you either jump (or hover in midair by tapping the jump button twice) or “skate” along the ground propelled by rockets. Also, Ramsey’s wanzers are equipped with another meter for the aforementioned edge, which, when full, can be used to slow down time, highlighting enemy targets in red and doubling his damage.

After smashing through these foes, we skipped ahead to the next level–an on-foot mission that requires Ramsey to infiltrate the Fort Monus installation and reactivate the four hidden wanzers parked inside. On foot, Front Mission Evolved seems to play a lot like a standard third-person shooter and handily lets you tuck and roll (useful for going from cover to cover) and acquire cover, from which you can blind-fire by poking your weapon above your head. The installation was guarded by shotgun troopers, who come barreling toward you to blast you at close range, and machine gun troopers, who take things more slowly and tend to take cover themselves. Luckily, on foot, Ramsey has a handful of grenades he can use to flush them out. Unluckily, his grenades don’t work that well against actual wanzers, such as the one he has to battle in this mission. The tight confines of the warehouse-like installation gave this battle a claustrophobic feel, and since most of the cover in Front Mission Evolved can be destroyed, we had to stay moving in order to stay alive, lest our enemy just blast the walls and pillars we hid behind.

After sitting through the single-play session, we jumped into a team-based multiplayer match that resembled the domination modes of the Battlefield series. This map took place in downtown New York (all six of the game’s multiplayer maps will be modified versions of locales from the single-player game) and had three giant turrets across it. Our team’s mission was to capture and hold these turrets for as long as possible. As it turns out, capping a turret not only nets your team some victory points (multiplayer matches can be set to a 500-point or 1,000-point limit), but also activates the turret to automatically attack the enemy team–which means that in order to recapture the point, your foes will have to blow up that turret and then stand near the wreckage to recapture it and reactivate it.

In multiplayer, you either destroy or get destroyed.

While Evolved’s multiplayer has arcade-style pickup items for extra ammo and armor (Edge mode isn’t available in multiplayer), the pacing in a full 10-player match can get so frantic that you won’t really have time to meticulously hunt them down. We headed into battle with a preloaded medium wanzer (you can take several preset wanzers based on those you’ll find in the game, but can also have slots you can use to build up to five different custom robots with whichever weapons and equipment you prefer). Once the action converges on a turret, confrontation gets fast and furious as players open up with their machine guns and paint you with missile locks. In addition, if you don’t have a weapon equipped in a free hand, you can perform a melee attack, and this deals huge damage if you can score a hit. On foot, wanzers move frustratingly slowly, so when it’s go time, we tended to find ourselves either hitting the jumpjets to hover above our targets to lock in missile salvos, or skating around like mad trying to avoid enemy missiles while laying down our own fire or getting in close for a melee kill.

Front Mission Evolved will be released later this month for the PC, Xbox 360, and PS3, and the PC version will support 3D graphics by way of Nvidia’s stereoscopic goggles.

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It turns out Italian-American service organizations aren’t the only ones who disapprove of Mafia II. According to MEGamers.com, which focuses on gaming in the Middle East, 2K Games’ well-reviewed open-world mobster simulator has been banned in the United Arab Emirates.

Though the confederation of Persian Gulf kingdoms such as Dubai and Abu Dhabi didn’t reportedly offer a reason for the ban, the game’s depiction of violence, language, and nudity was likely a major factor. A character’s prolific consumption of alcohol, which is forbidden by the UAE’s dominant religion of Islam, was also likely a factor. 2K reps had not responded to requests for confirmation on or the reasons for the reported ban as of press time.

The UAE won’t let consumer have their say about Mafia II.

Mafia II’s banning comes three weeks after UNICO National, the US’s largest Italian-American heritage foundation, asked 2K parent company Take-Two Interactive to not release the game. The organization’s president, Andre DiMino, accused Take-Two of “inappropriate and insulting perpetuation of the pervasive and denigrating stereotype of organized crime being the exclusive domain of Italians and Italian-Americans.”

In a statement provided to GameSpot, Take-Two chairman Strauss Zelnick rebuffed UNICO and DiMino’s charges. He declared, “Mafia II tells a compelling story about organized crime in America – a subject that for decades has been featured in movies, television shows and novels.”

Out on the PlayStation 3, PC, and Xbox 360, Mafia II follows would-be wise guy Vito, a first-generation Italian-American trying to escape a life of poverty during the 1940s and 1950s. Desperate to improve his station, Vito joins his friend Joe in la famiglia with the hopes of rising through the ranks and becoming a made man. Take-Two is touting the game’s attention to period detail, going so far as to strike a deal with Playboy to include era-appropriate magazines in the game.

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Late Night will be the next expansion pack for The Sims 3, and while it has echoes of the Hot Date expansion for the original version of The Sims, it’ll offer a whole lot more. We recently had a chance to briefly try out the new content, start a band, moonlight as a bartender, and explore the game’s…unusual interpretation of rated-T-for-teen bloodsucking.

Producer Grant Rodiek describes Late Night as a “return to the open-ended gameplay of The Sims” in reference to how the expansion will focus more on socializing and exploration, in contrast to World Adventures and Ambitions, which were more focused on directed, role-playing game-like advancement. Instead, Late Night will focus on getting your sims out of the house and into the nightlife at various clubs throughout the brand-new town of Bridgeport, which was modeled after both the bohemian city of San Francisco and the home of tinseltown, Los Angeles. These clubs include anything from lowly dive bars to the trendiest of the venues, where the bouncers only let in the social elite. Late Night will have a “hotspot” system that highlights which of the town’s clubs will be the most crowded and which will be flat-out empty.

The hotspot system plays into several of Late Night’s new features, such as the new “celebrity level.” All sims can gain up to five levels of notoriety (indicated by a 5-star meter that floats above each one’s head). At lower levels of fame, your sims will be able to only get into low-end clubs and will get checked by bouncers unless you have other skills that can sneak you through, such as computer hacking, which can get you in through the back door. At higher levels of fame, not only will your sims be welcomed with open arms through the velvet ropes, you may even be able to pick up some extra cash being a professional party-crasher, taking in a little extra cash from nightclub owners to grace their parties with your presence and have your picture taken, not unlike certain Los Angeles-based starlets whose primary claim to fame is…showing up at parties.

Parties are important for making a little extra scratch in Late Night. For instance, if you’re taking advantage of Late Night’s new bartending feature, for which you can collect recipes from books and from skill advancements. Late Night has plenty of new, and goofy, animations for stirring, shaking, and mixing up advanced “juice” cocktails to serve for cold, hard cash. And if you happen to be in a band, your bread and butter is playing gigs. Fortunately, Late Night actually expands the range of instruments you can play beyond just electric guitars–you can also play piano, upright bass, or a drum kit (no Rock Band 3 playset, though). While your musically-inclined sims can try to earn a little spare change outside the subway station playing alone (assuming they don’t get mugged, which they can be in Late Night), they’ll make the most scratch playing a happenin’ club.

A hip rock-and-roll combo can be yours in Late Night, though sadly, none of the Doobie Brothers will be available.

This is why, if you’re in a band, you need to keep an eye on the local paper or your ear to the ground (talking to the town’s movers and shakers) to make sure that you can play a venue that isn’t totally dead. You get gigs from The Sims 3’s opportunity system (so they’ll pop up randomly)–we got one to play a dive bar downtown, so we used Late Night’s new “group” system to get everyone there. This new system causes grouped sims to stick together when on the go and hang out with each other–this increases the likelihood that they’ll stick together (rather than have the annoying tendency to wander off), and it also seems to accelerate the rate that grouped sims grow closer, since they’re more likely to interact with each other continuously. They’re also more likely to get involved in Late Night’s new social activities, which include pub games like darts.

In any case, music groups can either use a “jam session” social action to practice their skills, or they can use a full-on “performance” social to put on a show. While performing, sims can attempt to pull off a “sweet move” social in the middle of their set, which, with a high music skill will mean a dramatic guitar windmill that delights the crowds, while with a low music skill, your sims will likely fall on their faces and fail utterly. Not so good for their ego, but a humorous scene–something the fans have been asking for more of.

As mentioned, Late Night will also let you play as a vampire, and as Rodiek explains, “they won’t get all sparkly, like in Twilight–they’ll have more of a soft glow.” The producer described vampire sims as being “badass” and “powerful”–primarily because although they can’t survive during the day, they thrive at night with enhanced motives (The Sims’ version of personal needs) that require very little maintenance. However, being vampires, they do need to drink “plasma” from other sims, and the best way to do so is to hunt for a prime victim.

Vampire sims can trigger a “hunting” social which causes non-vampires to appear as heat-generating silhouettes. Once vampires find a prime target with the best plasma, they then need to convince their target to consensually let them feed–an act that can be done gladly if the victim is a close friend (at which point the feeding looks like an affectionate embrace), or it can be done reluctantly, which causes the victims to grudgingly roll up their sleeves to allow for the act. Vampires have powerful mind control abilities they can use to convince their victims, and they can also read minds–meaning they can immediately ascertain a stranger’s entire list of traits, rather than having to chat them up.

Late Night will have vampires. They won’t be sparkly, but they will have to ask before they bite.

In addition to all the clubbin’ and vampirin’, Late Night will add more customization and building options to play with, including expensive new penthouse apartments that have limited size, but can be tricked out with the absolute latest in high-end swank, such as a gigantic digital fishtank that hangs on the wall, and a returning Sims favorite, the hot tub, which can seat up to four characters. In addition, you can expect to see plenty of new clothing sets and character customization that befit the social elite (and all those poseur wannabes), like draw-on muscle T-shirts, and new, more-muscular body types for those who prefer to play as a spray-tanned muscle man. When we asked the producer whether the new body types had anything to do with the popularity of MTV’s Jersey Shore, Rodiek replied, “we here [on the Sims development team] are all about The Situation.” And oh yes, Late Night will add a much-requested breast adjustment tool for those who absolutely must increase their bust. So, yes…there’s that.

Late Night appears to be a return to the classic open-ended Sims gameplay of schmoozing, building, and designing. The expansion will ship next month.

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In a recent interview, Valve Software’s Gabe Newell promised three big surprises for gamers in the next 12 months. One such surprise could have been revealed today, as Telltale Games announced a company crossover poker game costarring the Heavy character from Valve’s Team Fortress 2.

Just don’t get caught cheating.

Set for release on the PC and Mac this fall, Poker Night at The Inventory brings The Heavy along with Max (Sam and Max), Tycho (Penny Arcade), and Strong Bad (Homestar Runner), for a card game that examines iconic gaming characters in a different context.

“We’ve had the idea for some time of exploring the idea of what video characters do when they’re not ‘on the clock’ in the games we play,” Telltale CEO Dan Connors said in announcing the game. “We pitched the idea to friends in the industry and it really resonated. We all had a great time imagining what these guys would banter about while slinging cards–from there, Poker Night at The Inventory was born.”

Touting the project as “The Citizen Kane of poker games,” Telltale said Poker Night at The Inventory will do more than just deal cards and take bets. The game will also include a dynamic dialogue system and fully voiced characters that taunt each other, have their own “tells,” and adapt to each game situation as it plays out.

Although Telltale is best known for its episodic adventure games, Poker Night at The Inventory is not the first hand of cards it has dealt. The first title developed by the company was 2005’s Telltale Texas Hold ‘Em, a card game that sought to combine poker acumen with Telltale’s distinctive sense of humor.

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According to GLaDOS, Portal 2’s dry-witted antagonist, scientific achievement is all about cooperation. That’s why one of history’s greatest scientific teams is the duo of “Albert Einstein and his cousin Terry.” Of course, it’s pretty obvious she’s lying through her robot teeth on that one. But what would Portal be without a villain spouting out hilarious bits of grossly inaccurate misinformation at every turn? That’s just Portal. But all this cooperation business? Well, that’s certainly new.

Fortunately Valve is here at PAX 2010 to explain what co-op is all about, as this new feature was the focus of the developer’s latest Portal 2 demo. To put it in context, this mode is one of the many new ways Portal 2 is expanding on its predecessor. In addition to a single-player story that Valve claims will last about twice as long as the first Portal, the co-op mode will clock in at roughly the same length–making for an overall package that’s supposedly four times as large as the original Portal.

Co-op tells a parallel story to the single-player mode, with a pair of new robotic protagonists simply named Blue and Orange. They’re an oddly cute pair, one squat and one oblong, looking almost like a robotic Bert and Ernie. The two players can interact with each other in a variety of ways that range from critical to solving puzzles all the way to almost entirely nonsensical. The latter includes the ability to wave at one another, or just simply start dancing in celebratory glee.

But as hard as it may be to hear, dancing alone won’t solve puzzles. To solve puzzles, you’ll need to master the new co-op mechanics. We were shown a few examples of ways the two players will have to interact with each other to progress through GLaDOS’ increasingly devious death traps. One very basic option is a paint tool that lets one player tag a surface in order to indicate to his or her teammate that this is the place where you need to drop a portal. According to Valve, this is to alleviate the vague gesturing and eventual frustrated shouting that tends to creep up whenever two players are trying to tell each other where to go in an online game.

Beyond simply tagging walls and surfaces, you can now work together by combining your portals to send one player to areas he wouldn’t normally be able to reach on his own. As one example, Valve showed us how infinite falling can work in a co-op scenario: Player B sets up two portals above each other and lets Player A fall infinitely between the two. Then, Player B carefully aims and shoots a portal onto a distant wall to launch Player A–with all that built-up momentum–across a pit of deadly goo and onto a safe ledge. There were times in the first game when you could do something like this, but infinite falling was almost always too disorienting to use strategically. But with a friend at your side, it’s suddenly a mechanic that can be used quite a bit more often.

Adding more complexity are some of the new objects you can interact with in the world. One we were shown was a reflector cube designed to reflect the path of deadly lasers. These come in handy whenever the door leading to your goal is powered down, making it necessary to guide laser beams to laser receptacles to power the door back up. One player drops the cube in a certain location, while another drops portals around to carefully guide the laser beam along. The trick, of course, is making sure you don’t accidentally zap your buddy with a deadly laser beam along the way.

Everything we were shown suggested a very promising follow-up to the original Portal. This new co-op mode is looking a bit more complex and heavy on mechanics, so it could very well provide a much steeper learning curve. But between GLaDOS’ reliably laugh-worthy dialogue–and there was plenty of it–and the sense of accomplishment that goes along with solving those puzzles, we’ll go ahead and assume that the steeper climb will be worth it. You can expect to see Portal 2 arrive on February 9.

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Who was there: Gearbox Software claimed the 2010 Penny Arcade Expo as its own on Friday with the shock announcement that it would see Duke Nukem Forever to the finish line in 2011. On hand to discuss the move, as well as the rest of Gearbox’s announced development slate, was CEO Randy Pitchford, chief creative officer Brian Martel, creative director Mikey Neumann, licensing head David Eddings, and cinematics director Brian Thomas.

“Always bet on Duke.”

What they talked about: Though Friday’s revelation that Gearbox would be finishing up 3D Realms’ Duke Nukem Forever was perhaps the biggest news out of the Penny Arcade Expo, the studio followed it up with another headline-worthy announcement. Namely, Pitchford revealed in front of the PAX 2010 collective that Gearbox has acquired the Duke Nukem intellectual property, including Duke Nukem Forever and all future developments in the franchise, from 3D Realms. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

Explaining how the deal went down, Pitchford noted that he and Martel had actually met while working at 3D Realms, way back in 1997, and Gearbox still had a strong relationship with George Broussard and others at that studio. “I feel like I owe Duke Nukem my career,” he said, before bringing up last year’s turmoil of 3D Realms’ closure and the lawsuits that resulted. “That day sucked, but you can’t kill Duke.”

He said that even with the game’s future grim, about eight or nine former 3D Realms developers continued to work on Duke Nukem Forever, including Allen Blum, who has been working on the franchise since its inception in 1991. The game they were making is the same that is being made at Gearbox, he said, noting that Blum and the others–but not Broussard–are still on the team. He also said that the game is currently in the polish phase, and that “arrangements need to be made with first-parties and retailers.” Apparently, 2K Games hadn’t even informed retailers of the game’s existence until it was announced on Friday.

“The game that is happening is 3D Realms’ game,” he said. In an emotional moment, Pitchford went on to say that, “I didn’t buy [Duke Nukem] from them, they sold it to me,” emphasizing how protective 3D Realms has been of its quintessential action hero.

“Gearbox was the only home appropriate for the Duke Nukem brand,” Broussard said as part of a statement. “They are very talented and possess the perfect perspective and understanding of the brand. Their vision for its future direction is exciting and unbelievable. I personally cannot wait for fans to see their unique take on the franchise.”

“The Gearbox Software team and I are ecstatic that we have grown to a position to be able to pick up and carry the torch and help Duke rise back to glory in his time of need,” Pitchford added. “Fans of the legendary hero and all the incredible talent that have ever helped him all deserve the very best support that we can bring.”

For more information on Duke Nukem Forever, check out GameSpot’s hands-on with the game from PAX 2010.

As for the rest of what Gearbox has been working on, the team first discussed what was going on with the Borderlands franchise. Namely, Pitchford noted that Borderlands’ fourth, and ostensibly final, downloadable content add-on–Claptrap’s New Robot Revolution–will arrive on September 28. He also noted that all Borderlands owners will receive a free patch for the game that rebalances it and increases the level cap to 69.

Of that innuendoed number, Pitchford said that they did not want to alienate Borderlands fans who purchased General Knox for the sake of gaining that DLC’s 11-level cap increase. “We realized that if we added eight levels, with the cap at level 61, it wouldn’t piss off people who paid for the General Knox DLC.” A release date for the free patch has yet to be determined, but Pitchford noted that it should arrive some time around the launch of Claptrap’s New Robot Revolution.

Martel then briefly discussed Gearbox’s Brothers in Arms franchise, saying that they had nothing to announce today. However, he did emphasize Gearbox’s commitment to the franchise, hinting that the series may branch out from the characters established in recent installments. “We’ll have some things to talk about soon. We’re not ready quite yet to bring it out,” Pitchford added.

Martel also didn’t have any news about Aliens Colonial Marines, noting that it has been difficult to talk about the game due to involvement from rights owner 20th Century Fox and publisher Sega. However, Pitchford seemed to bend the rules a bit, calling for a rapid-fire succession of screenshots of the game to be shown on the conference hall’s big screen.

Though brief, the shots showed a group of marines engaging richly detailed alien drones in what appeared to be a space station’s corridors. The shots were highly reminiscent of the tone established by Ridley Scott’s 1979 original Alien.

Quote: “Always bet on Duke.”–Randy Pitchford.

Takeaway: The next game Gearbox will deliver is the Duke Nukem Forever that has been more than a decade in the making, with many of the original developers still working on the project. Of course, fans of the series probably won’t believe it until they see it, a fact Gearbox recognized and promised to do something about as soon as possible.

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Dragon Age: Origins swept thousands of would-be adventurers away with an epic storyline that told the tale of a land torn apart by war, and the role of your character, a member of the powerful Grey Wardens legion, to bring peace. Over the course of that adventure, your character met the likes of knights, thieves, traitors, and faithful hounds. Your character also met Morrigan, a mysterious witch whose powerful sorcery made her a valuable ally but whose actions…well, let’s just say she didn’t always share your goals throughout your journey. Over the course of the original game and its ensuing downloadable content updates, Morrigan vanished from the world on her own uknown quest, and in Witch Hunt, the final DLC update for Dragon Age, you’ll eventually track her down and be able to get some answers out of her. Please note that this story contains spoilers, both about the original game, and about the DLC itself.

Witch Hunt is described as being somewhere between 90 minutes to two hours long, and once again lets you either create a new Grey Warden character, or to import your existing character to play as. Since the DLC focuses on Morrigan, if you chose to involve your character in a romantic relationship with her, your dialogue options when you finally track her down will change, and if you decided to have a child with her, your speech choices will also be different.

True warriors can win any battle with a faithful hound at their side.

In any case, Witch Hunt will let you revisit several locales from the original game, such as Flemeth’s old home in the swamp and the Circle of Mages (from the original game’s mage origin story), while meeting up to three new companions who can join your party. We began the adventure outside of Flemeth’s home, searching for clues as to Morrigan’s whereabouts and were greeted by the first companion, a Mabari hound (who, if you’ve imported a character who played through the original game, will be your original dog character, or will be an all-new companion if you’re using a new character to play the DLC). After being joined by the faithful hound, we entered the hovel to find the female elf warrior Ariane who also hunted Morrigan, since the sorceress had apparently stolen away an ancient elven tome from her tribe. After striking a quick truce with the elf (who became our second companion), we then made our way to the mage’s circle–both to research “eluvian,” the topic of the mysterious elven book and also to meet the DLC’s third companion, the mageling Finn.

Since our time with the DLC was limited, we skipped ahead to a few key points in the game, including a new boss battle with a new monster, the “varterral” (otherwise known as “the strider”)–a powerful critter that will appear in Dragon Age 2 (just like how the previous DLC update, Golems of Amgarrak, also contained a monster that will appear in the sequel). The strider is an enormous, creepy-crawly critter that resembles a giant, spindly-legged spider made of driftwood. This giant creature has numerous abilities that can incapacitate your party members and also has a challenging habit of leaping into the air if it’s getting too beaten up to escape your frontline fighters. Thankfully, we were playing a pre-loaded save game with characters that BioWare helpfully advanced to extremely high levels, so while the battle was a close one, it wasn’t impossible.

We then skipped ahead to our final saved games–saved games for characters, some of whom had romanced Morrigan, others of whom hadn’t. These last saved games were set just before the DLC’s conclusion–at the moment where the party catches up with Morrigan and the main character can interrogate her. It seems that Morrigan has discovered a fully-functional eluvian–the magic mirrors from the original game that can potentially act as portals to another world, though to the enchantress’s touch, the surface of the mirror rippled like water.

Goodbye, Morrigan.

Despite the fact that we’re basically spoiling the ending of the DLC in this story (and with it, the saga of the original Dragon Age), you can take comfort in the fact that Morrigan was her usual cryptic self, and generally avoided giving a straight answer to nearly all of our questions. When asked about her intentions, she simply replied that she had much to do that required her to acquire power over time, and that her adopted mother Flemeth was the real threat (and depending on whether you elected to kill Flemeth, you can take a slightly different dialogue choice here). When asked about the child, Morrigan says only that the child is somewhere safe, and being prepared for “what is to come.” After barely giving you any kind of answers to your questions, you must then bid the witch farewell, though how you choose to end your meeting with her is up to you.

Witch Hunt will be released this Tuesday, September 7.

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Yesterday as part of his prolific Twitter stream, 3D Realms president
George Broussard posted a cryptic picture of pigs flying. Today, the reason became clear. At PAX Prime in Seattle,
Gearbox president Randy Pitchford took the stage to announce that his studio has taken over Duke Nukem Forever, which had been in development at the now-all-but-defunct 3D Realms since 1997.

Hail to the king, baby!

Speaking to a shocked and enthusiastic crowd, Pitchford said, “We can’t let the Duke die, right? The guys at 3D Realms who put their hearts and souls into this, so we wanted to make sure it hits all the platforms. It’s coming to PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and PC in 2011.”

Pitchford also told the
Wall Street Journal that Gearbox took over the game in late 2009, following the quasi-closure of 3D Realms and tit-for-tat lawsuits between 3D Realms and Duken Nukem Forever publisher Take-Two Interactive. (He also told the paper the game was coming out in 2010, but he said 2011 at PAX today.)

“Clearly the game hadn’t been finished at 3D Realms but a lot of content had been created,” Pitchford told the Journal. “The approach and investment and process at 3D Realms didn…t quite make it and it cracked at the end. With Gearbox Software we brought all those pieces together. It’s the game it was meant to be.”

Duke Nukem Forever is playable on the PAX Prime show floor.

Scott Miller, owner and CEO of 3D Realms, also reflected to the Journal why his studio failed to complete the game. “We were probably too much of a perfectionist about the game. When some other game had some great feature come out, we wanted to match it…We’d been distracted on other games like Prey. It was a combination of those things. We were trying to build a game that was too great.”

Duke Nukem Forever will feature beasties like this.

Duke Nukem Forever isn’t the first Duke Nukem game that Gearbox has worked on.
In June, court filings in the Take-Two Interactive lawsuit against Duke Nukem Forever developer 3D Realms (incorporated as Apogee Software) revealed that another game featuring the first-person shooter icon was in the works at a “well-known game developer” as early as 2007. That mystery developer was, in fact, Gearbox.

The Duke Nukem-Gearbox connections don’t stop there. Before forming Gearbox, Pitchford worked at 3D Realms on an expansion for Duke Nukem 3D for the PC. (The game was rereleased in 2008 as an Xbox Live Arcade title.) “People like George Broussard and the 3D Realms team are the reason I got into gaming,” said Pitchford during today’s speech.

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We’ll spare you any history lessons on Duke Nukem Forever. If you follow video games at all, you likely know the long, rocky, infamous–and did we say long?–history behind this first-person shooter. All you need to know is that it’s actually playable here at PAX 2010. Granted, as you’d expect, there’s quite a line to see it. But if there was ever a game where a lengthy queue was appropriate, it’s this one. CEO of Gearbox Randy Pitchford certainly knows. “I heard the line outside was 13 years long,” Pitchford joked while giving a presentation on how new developer Gearbox picked up the project after 3D Realms collapsed last year.

To give a quick summary, Pitchford described his personal attachment to the franchise (Duke Nukem 3D was the first game he worked on before forming his own studio) as well as the reason publisher 2K Games trusted Gearbox to salvage the project (“we brought them a megahit with Borderlands”). But it was a quick introduction, followed by a new trailer and the opportunity for everyone there to get some hands-on time with a couple of different levels.

The trailer was Duke at his ridiculous best, punching giant aliens below the belt, spouting one-liners, and taking more than a few self-referential jabs at himself. After that, it was time to play the game. The demo started off simply enough: You’re standing in front of a urinal in a men’s room with the screen politely directing you to pull the right trigger to begin urinating. This opening scene sets the table rather appropriately for a brief but utterly absurd demo. A few seconds later, you walk up to some EDF forces in a locker room drawing plans to deal with the current alien invasion on a whiteboard. One soldier–the only one left standing amid a number of mangled survivors–invites you to offer your advice, and after a little first-person whiteboard scribbling by the player, that soldier remarks something to the effect of, “That’s a great plan! If we had done that, that guy over there would still have his arm!””Pause. “And at least one of his balls.”

Duke, being a man of action, quickly runs through the tunnels of this football stadium–it turns out that’s where the demo starts–and out onto the field. Standing on the 50-yard line is a giant one-eyed alien monster called the Cycloid. Fortunately, Duke has just picked up a rocket launcher called the Devastator. Using this handy little weapon, you run all over the rain-soaked field dodging the boss’s attacks while occasionally firing rockets at his single, solitary eye. After a couple of minutes, the beast is felled, and Duke celebrates by ripping out his eye and kicking a field goal with it.

After this, the game’s first level, we were quickly transported to the 15th level. This one begins in some arid canyons with Duke cruising along in his signature monster truck. The controls are simple: just pull the right trigger to accelerate and hit the B button to handbrake around a corner. This sequence seemed like a bit of a palate cleanser, as there wasn’t a whole lot of challenge–just cruise along, look cool, and splatter the occasional pig alien too stupid to get out of your way. But you run out of gas before arriving at a small canyon village and have to do on-foot battle against a bunch of ugly aliens.

To help even the odds, the game scatters a few useful guns around the little town. There’s the railgun, which comes in handy for remote sniping; the shrink ray, which turns your enemies into tiny things that are almost too adorable to kill; and a turret gun for dealing with a landing enemy spaceship. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to progress past said spaceship before the allotted demo time was over. But we’ll go ahead and assume there were aliens, guns, and one-liners to be found after a successful completion. Call it a hunch.

If there’s one thing that surprised us about the demo, it’s this: Duke Nukem Forever is pretty darn fun for a game with such a tumultuous development. The comic timing was impressive, the guns felt satisfying, and the graphics were quite pleasing to look at. Of course, this is a Duke Nukem game through and through, so there are some inherent elements to it that will instantly turn some people off. But pick up a controller, spend a few minutes with it, and you’ll be surprised at how well it has turned out. Whether the rest of the game can follow suit is something we’re eager to see. Stay tuned for more.

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Next Monday is Labor Day, a national holiday in the US and the traditional end of summer. And once the barbecues have cooled and the last cold beverage has been plucked from the cooler, the week will see the start of the end-of-the-year game flood.

Superhero fans will get a double-dose of games on Tuesday, when Warner Bros. releases Batman: The Brave and the Bold (DS, Wii) and Activision ships Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions (Xbox 360, DS, PlayStation 3, Wii). Unlike the dark and violent Arkham Asylum, the former title is geared to a younger audience, with a cel-shaded look and co-starring the caped crusader’s longtime companion Robin. Meanwhile, the T for Teen-rated Shattered Dimensions will see four different versions of the famous webslinger trade blows and quip webslinger trade blows and quips with villains as he tries to reassemble a broken artifact.

Gamers will play as four incarnations of Spider-Man in Shattered Dimensions.

Ubisoft is releasing two titles this week in two different genres. After a slight delay, the feint-focused World War II strategy title R.U.S.E. will arrive on the PC, PS3, and Xbox 360. Those same platforms and the Wii will also receive HAWX 2, the sequel to the decently reviewed, Tom Clancy-branded air combat simulator.

Hockey fans will fans will also have a pair of games to choose from this week, both from Electronic Arts. NHL 11, the latest annual iteration of EA Sports’ rink-and-puck franchise, will ship for the PS3 and X360 on Tuesday. The company is also releasing NHL Slapshot, a more arcade-style hockey game for the Wii.

The PSP will see a major release in the form of Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep, the newest installmentin the Square Enix’-Disney crossover franchise. The role-playing game lit up Japan’s game software sales charts upon its debut in January, selling some 445,000 units within its first week on the market.

Fans of more bizarre Japanese games can sample the Xbox 360-exclusive Otomedius Excellent. Konami’s hybrid game combines Gradius-style side-scrolling space warfare and combines it with visuals of exaggeratedly proportioned, attractive anime girls.

Otomedius Excellent is…excellent?

For further details on the week’s games, visit GameSpot’s
New Releases page. The full list of downloadable games on the PlayStation Store, Xbox Live Marketplace, and Wii Shop Channel will be revealed later this week. Release dates are based on retailer listings and are subject to change.

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6 (LABOR DAY)

Photo World DSi–DS–Puzzle–Interworks Unlimited, Inc.



TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 7

101-in-1 Sports Megamix–DS–Puzzle–Atlus

Aion: Assault on Balaurea–PC–Role-Playing–NCsoft

Batman: The Brave and the Bold–DS, WII–Action–Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment

Brunswick Cosmic Bowling–WII–Sports–CokeM Interactive

Dawn of Heroes–DS–Role-Playing–Majesco Games

Dragon Age: Origins – Witch Hunt–PC, PS3, X360–Role-Playing–Electronic Arts

Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep–PSP–Role-Playing–Square Enix

Kung Fu Rider–PS3–Action–SCEA

Midnight Mysteries: The Edgar Allan Poe Conspiracy–DS–Adventure–MumboJumbo

NHL 11–PS3, X360–Sports–Electronic Arts

NHL Slapshot–WII–Sports–EA Sports

Otomedius Excellent–X360–Action–Konami

R.U.S.E.–PC, PS3, X360–Strategy–Ubisoft

Saints Row Diamond 2-Pack–X360–Puzzle–THQ

Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions–X360, DS, PS3, WII–Action–Activision

The Sims 3: Fast Lane Stuff–MAC, PC–Puzzle–Electronic Arts

Tom Clancy’s HAWX 2–PS3, X360–Action–Ubisoft

UFC 2010 Undisputed–PSP–Fighting–THQ



WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8

Amnesia: The Dark Descent–PC–Adventure–Frictional Games

Plants vs. Zombies–X360–Strategy–PopCap



THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 9

No releases scheduled



FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 10

Recettear–PC–Puzzle–Carpe Fulgur

Operation Barbarossa – The Struggle for Russia–PC–Strategy–Matrix Games

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