World in Conflict demo now on 3FL!

One of the Beta tested titles recently is a mutliplayer-RTS by the name of World in Conflict.

The game is set to be released on the 20th of September in Australia, and will be a sure hit amongst RTS fans. World in Conflict will offer both a single player campaign and a multiplayer mode which divides up to 16 players between two teams, the Soviet Union and the USA.  

For those who haven' heard of WiC before, the below paragraph has been taken from the official website. 

World in Conflict is the action strategy game where players defend their country, their hometown, and their families in the face of Soviet-led World War III, delivering an epic struggle of courage and retribution. You are a field commander leading the era's most powerful military machines in the heroic effort to turn back the invasion…one city and suburb at a time. This war isn't on television. It's on our soil and in our backyards.

Check out what all the buzz is about and download the demo from 3FL.

Medal of Honour – Airborne demo on 3FL!

The franchise that pioneered the WWII FPS genre has come back with a new title, Medal of Honour: Airborne promises players a true and unique interactive experience by means of a nonlinear delivery of gameplay. Each stage begins with players parachuting into the combat zone, behind enemy lines – wherever they feel like, this potentially allows players to choose their plan of attack and can work their way through by any means. Which breathes fresh air into the FPS genre, with the done and exhausted formula of starting in a common spot and working their way onwards, Medal of Honour: Airborne allows players to freely roam the open world to complete their missions.

Medal of Honour: Airborne won't be released until September, however we are lucky enough to have the demo on 3FL for your previewing pleasure!

Medal of Honour: Airborne Demo on 3FL

Grab it now, and tell us what you think! 

Xbox 360 News!

• Potential buyers who have been holding out may warm to the recent event of Microsoft dropping the price of the Xbox range in Australia, much to the tune of the US/Europe/etc. The full featured Xbox comes down from $649 to a tasty $579, with the base model dropping a $100 from $499 to $399 which many will identify closely hovers around Nintendo Wii territory.
• In a press release from Halo 3's developers Bungie, apparently Halo 3 is roughly 99.9% complete! 
• A 14 year old from the US has tried to combat the 360's overheating issues and nearly electrocutes himself.

Bioshock PC demo now on 3FL!

Lucky Xbox 360 owners have been giving the Bioshock demo a good thrashing these last couple of days much to the disgust of PC (only) owners world wide. An announcement was made last week that the demo for Bioshock PC would soon be released, and we are lucky enough to be able to host the demo demo here on 3FL!

Bioshock Demo (PC) on 3FL

Sizing in at 1.84 GB the demo allows for approximately 30 minutes of gameplay, players are strongly recommended to update their graphics drivers first as it has been said the delayed release of this demo was pending the updated driver release for ATI and NVIDIA.

Classified!

The Australian government first aroused the video game community when they banned Duke Nukem 3D, however the distributor Apogee Software was quick to offer a permanent 'block' on the offending content which allowed the game to be released. Although the community was quick to remove the block, unlocking the original content of the game, this was one of the first well known examples of video game censorship in Australia. Earlier examples include Phantasmagoria, Voyeur (including the sequel), Dreamweb and Postal. At this time Australian OFLC lacked a standard in video game ratings, and it wasn't until 2003 that the ratings were brought under the same guidelines as film.

control the sale of video games. Without an R18+ rating, many violent games will be either be banned outright or modified for an audience of 15 years and older. More so that many games are pushed through as an MA15+ game, when they should be receiving an R18+ rating similar to other regions. Additionally many parents will allow the sale of MA15+ games to their children as they don't see the significance that this is the most restricted rating available. This results in many games which aren't suitable for audiences of 15 years and often younger legally accessing content which should be restricted to 18+ only.

Unfortunately issues such as censorship and classifications are usually political and subject to media hype. Although there have been many attempts, it looks like we are stuck with this system for now. My only hope is that soon the current classification system be reviewed and the introduction of an R18+ rating is approved. Until then Australia will be stuck with an ineffective rating system which will result in the sale of inappropriate content to minors, and censorship of an artform.

Gaming Related News

• 13 year old Xbox owner shows his hate for the Playstation 3 by defacing game cases in Toys R Us.
• Thor, another up and coming comic turned big screen adaptation. 
• Watch out heathens, Bibleman is coming to your PC and console! 
• Electronic Arts is teaming up with Hasbro.
• Demonstration of versatility or an abundance? The PS3 is being used to run upcoming Warhawk's dedicated servers.

Quakecon 2007

Links 
QuakeCon Official Website
1UP.com's keynote recap

Industry News 2.08.07

The news is starting to build as the industry warms up to Christmas.

• Microsoft talk about creating market dominance using games.
• Episodic gaming is getting the big tick as developers Telltale and Hothead talk about the medium at at last week's San Diego Comic-Con.
• 1up have a great interview with Keiji Inafune, talking about RE5, Shadows of Rome, Mega Man, and Onimusha.
• Although details are very slim on the ground, make sure you keep your eyes open for Mirror's Edge. Developed by DICE (who made the BF series) looks to take FPS from the point and click genre into a more interactive and accessible environment. UK magazine Edge have the most details to date.
• Farcry 2 details starting to emerge.
• 2 player XBLA co-op on Halo 3 is just not going to cut it, so Bungie announces 4 player co-op instead!
• Dell join forces with Ascaron to help produce what looks to be far FAR better than Hellgate: London!!