Ken Levine Wants to Correct Industry Mistakes

Ken Levine, the creator of BioShock, spoke out in an interview with Forbes about PC gaming and its assorted difficulties. While the interview isn’t terribly long, its still an interesting read. Read more

Crysis: Warhead Details, Screenshots, Preview

Tiscali games has some juicy details about Crytek’s upcoming title; Crysis: Warhead. The details have been taken from their recent preview of the game. Check them out below:

• Begins when the original game’s Nomad character parts ways with Warhead’s new hero, Psycho, and follows him all the way until the two are to reunite again on board the aircraft carrier.
• Mostly located on the other side of the island.
• Less linear approach and more sandbox type of gameplay, as opposed to the original.
• Same nanosuit and the same functions, with more likely to be revealed later (definitely a “surprise” in that matter is promised).
• Singleplayer campaign to last 8-10 hours.
• At least two new weapons, the granade launcher and double SMG.
• Improved enemy AI, betterily able to organize itself and follow tactics.
• New vehicles incl. Armored Scout Recon (about the size of a jeep with a mounted gun) and a hovercraft, both playable in multiplayer as well.
• New team-based MP mode and less complex than the original two.
• Betterily optimized to run faster than the original game on the same hardware.
• Won’t require DX10 for maximum details and full effects.
• Dialogues done by Bioshock’s Susanna O’Connor.
• Completely stand-alone and as noted by developers, not an add-on but a full title.
• The possibility of Crysis 2 to rely heavily on Warhead’s sales.

Tiscali also has some screens. Well, to be fair, they are more like caps taken from videos. From the screens, the game will boast new weapons; A Grenade Launcher, Possibly an UZI, and the ability to duel wield the new weapons. The graphics and environments, so far, look identical to the original Crysis.

This month’s PCGamer will have a full-blown preview, so watch this space.

BioShock Should’ve Failed!

This is something you don’t hear everyday, the lead programmer of BioShock, Chris Kline, wanted BioShock to fail!

At his Paris GDC session exploring the development of 2K’s critical success BioShock, lead programmer Chris Kline started off by saying his main point would be that BioShock should’ve failed.

“In fact,” he continued, “it did fail a lot, over the course of time. A series of big mistakes and corrections and slipped ship dates, but all of these helped make it a good game.

BioShocking Hollywood

 

The critically acclaimed first-person-shooter from 2K Games is now coming to the big screen. 2K Games has come to terms with Universal Studios to develop a movie based on the successful video game. BioShock: The movie will be directed by Gore Verbinski - the director behind Pirates of Caribbean trilogy.

2K Games announced today that it has reached an agreement for BioShock®, the universally acclaimed smash-hit video game, to be developed as a feature film by Universal Pictures. 2K Games, whose 2K Boston and 2K Australia studios developed BioShock, is a video game publishing label of Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. (NASDAQ: TTWO).

Read more

Jordan Thomas Interview - What’s In Store for BioShock 2

Jordan Thomas of 2K Marin was interviewed by NextGEN. 2K Marin is developing BioShock 2 (the original was developed by 2K Boston/AUS) Here’s a snippet:
“Being bright-eyed and naïve,” says Thomas, “it’s sort of a critical phase of energy that everyone needs to maintain momentum as they move into the private sector. When you have someone expecting a commercial product out of you, some of your momentum will be ploughed off. You still need your Peter Pan attitude.”

Full interview here.

Strauss Zelnick Talks BioShock & Civilzation IV MMO Potential

Chairman of Take-Two Strauzz Zelnick, speaking at Smid Cap Conference, explained a few things. Among those things were the explanation on why they rejected EA’s buyout offer, but there also was an annoucement of BioShock and Civilzation IV as titles with MMO potential. On slide 24 of the presentation, both BioShock and Civilzation IV are mentioned as “untapped” potential MMO opportunities.

BioShock is even mentioned as a potential movie.

by MTV Multiplayer

Borderlands Delayed

In the same Investor QnA in which BioShock 2 went official, Take-Two have announced that Gearbox Software’s upcoming sci-fi first person shooter has been delayed from the original Fiscal Year 2008 to Fiscal Year 2009. From the official press release:

Fiscal 2008 guidance reflects the release of Borderlands for Xbox 360, PLAYSTATION 3 and Games for Windows® in fiscal 2009 instead of fiscal 2008 in order to allow additional development time for this highly anticipated game and provide a better balance in the release of Take-Two’s triple-A titles.

In the meantime, check out 5 high resolution Borderlands screenshots after the break. Read more

BioShock 2 is Official!

In the latest Take-Two QnA, Take-Two finally blew the whistle on the BioShock 2. Here’s a snip:

2K Games said today that BioShock 2, the sequel to the wholly owned and internally developed title, is being developed by 2K Marin and is planned for release in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2009. The critically acclaimed BioShock title has sold over 2 million units worldwide since its launch in August.

Take-Two full press release