|  |  |  | | | | | PC Gamer» PC Gamer – The global authority on PC games | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | As specified on Notch’s blog, Minecraft update 1.6 will mostly be about bug fixes. It will however include a very special addition – mapping. It’s going to be fun. Honest. Read on to find out why.
 Your crafted maps will centre on the area where you originally create it, and will gradually fill in as you explore your surroundings. Reach the edge of the parchment and the map will stop updating. Even more interesting is the upcoming “cloning” feature. It means that two people can hold the same map and see real-time blinking dots to indicate their position, like an old-school radar thing. Changes to the map won’t update in real-time – you’ll need to revisit locations to update the topography. 
We predict treasure hunts. Lots of treasure hunts. And servers packed with people role-playing pirates (please). Notch is currently working on the new feature, but specifies that it could lead to all kinds of exciting futuristic things like “books and notes written by players, and possibly even custom paintings/hand drawn signs.” Imagine Tom’s Minecraft Experiment if we made him craft every page individually from tree pulp. It would be twice as good. 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | It’s been less than 24 hours since patch 4.1 hit live servers, and Blizzard’s already showing off the raid and daily quest content coming in World of Warcraft’s next major content patch, 4.2. Read on for both videos (which show all of the bosses located inside the Firelands raid–filled with as much fire, magma, and associated burning things as you’d expect) and everything we know about Molten Front, the new zone being added, and how its progressively-unlocked quest hub in Molten Front will work.  This patch cannot come too soon, executus! Much like Burning Crusade’s popular Isle of Quel’Danas quest hub, players will complete daily quests (which look to be mostly about battling the fire lord’s minions, and restoring nature’s balance in the area) to progressively take over the Molten Front zone and unlock new content and changed landscapes. With the Isle of Quel’Danas, players started out with only a few daily quests to launch an invasion on the island. Then after those quests had been completed enough times by players, the server moved to phase 2, where your faction had established a foothold in the region, and you helped cleanse out the rest of the resistance with completely new daily quests. The final phase (which is what exists there today) unlocked a brand new phase that had a full encampment filled with vendors, portals and everything else you’d expect in a warcamp. Most importantly, the dungeon was unlocked for everyone on the server at that point. There is one major difference with the upcoming Molten Front, however: the developers have said that they want this progression to unlock per player, instead of for the entire realm, as it did with the Isle of Quel’Danas. The videos below shows massive trees finding their place amongst the lava-scarred landscape, which seems to indicate that the new reputation group will be a druid or shaman-based faction, who’s focused on restoring the balance of nature in the area. What do you think? Are you excited for another changing daily quest hub like the Isle of Quel’Danas? 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Legend speaks of an ancient blender far beyond the reach of mere mortals, and in it are blended the most fiendish of concoctions imaginable. It was in this blender that on a fabled and woebegone night a Blendtec wizard sought to create a dungeon crawler the likes of which Diablo and Torchlight had already seen, but with the dialog wheel and decision making of Dragon Age, the fisticuffs of an arcade beat-'em-up and just a few drops of blood from the master sequel crafters at Obsidian Entertainment. Into the wicked blender the ingredients went, and after the froth and bubbles and not a few screams, the wizard dispensed a mean little package and christened it Dungeon Siege III.  You should have seen him as a tadpole. Despite its borrowed trappings and engrossing decisions that are sure to make you stop and think, at its heart, DS3 is a co-op loot fest of old, and in that regard, it excels brilliantly. Rather than have you select a class, you select characters who each reflect familiar RPG qualities, such as DPS or healer, but who also come with back stories and allegiances that will flavor your path, and possibly color some of your decisions as you make your way through the land of Ehb. I choose Reinhart Manx, an older mage who specializes in magically assisted hand-to-hand combat and maniacal clockwork traps, and my partner selects Anjali, an archon capable of switching between a spear wielding human form, and a fire slinging elemental form.  RAWR! My favorite scenario is set deep in a shadowy forest, beyond the Lescanzi occupied town of Raven's Rill, where we must rid a haunted mansion of spectral terrors and deal with the trapped soul of a little girl that has been ensnared by an ancient artifact. Although there's quite a bit of narrative backdrop going on, DS3 doesn't allow that to get in the way of the fast-paced, narrative disinterested nature of co-op play. Cutscenes are skippable and almost every dialog sequence has an easy-out option. When we enter the mansion, my partner and I are almost instantly engaged by hordes of skeleton warriors complemented by undead archers and spell casting wraiths—it's here that DS3 really shines.  Time out! I dropped my contact lens. In human form, Anjali corrals melee units into tight clusters while I engage the ranged units with hard-hitting electrical blasts from across the room. Once my partner has gathered-up enough victims, I dart to the center and generate a circular clockwork trap on the floor. Its magical gears tick-tock away the last few seconds of our enemies' lives before all within the trap's radius are engulfed by yellow and green magical discharge. At the same time, my partner summons a fire jackal to harass a new band of enemies that have appeared behind us while I drop a huge glyph beneath them that causes damage over time. Our combined assault provides a much needed distraction that allows us to cast healing spells and mop-up the ranged units on an overlooking balcony with close-combat. My partner gets the coup de grace by detonating Anjali's fire jackal like some sick Nazi war tactic. With the battle done, we get to the real fun—loot.  Firedogmon, dash attack! The arena is littered with bits of armor and health and mana orbs (there are no health potions in DS3), and we quickly dart around the room to snap it all up. We then spend several minutes each checking out our new gear and min/maxing with DS3's convenient equipment system. Categories with something new are marked as such, and highlighting a new piece automatically pulls up a comparison window with red and green arrows indicating the traits of the new piece compared to what you already have equipped. In most circumstances, you're safe just going with the most green arrows and moving on, which is a huge boon when your co-op buddy is waiting to get back to the action. Compared to Torchlight, there are some big differences in combat. While Torchlight is action bar focused, DS3's combat is much more immediate—hit the punch key, and your wizard plants a lighting punch right in a zombie's face. But as I ventured around in co-op, I couldn't help but feel "this is so what Torchlight should have been." Playing a narrative-optional, loot heavy game is way more fun with friends, Diablo made that clear years ago. That said, if I'm going to tolerate this game at all with a mouse and keyboard, Obsidian has got to get their controls wrangled in. PC controls on the build I played weren't final, but with a June release fast approaching, they still need a ton of work. Sometimes more so than monsters, I found the camera to be my greatest enemy, the controls of which are shared by the mouse pointer, middle mouse button, scroll wheel and the "A" and "D" keys—WTF! My preview left me really wanting more, so I've got my fingers crossed that Obsidian is able to patch the control issue up before launch, especially now that the genre is finally starting to see fresh signs of life. 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Does everyone in the world love Minecraft? It seems so. Even Peter Molyneux is going on about it when he should be pimping Fable 3. We don’t know for sure if Duke likes it, but he’s an unpredictable chap at the best of times: celebrating the marriage of British monarchs, slapping ladies on the booty, being tardy. He’s surprisingly inconsistent. Click more for today’s bonus links.
- Another Brink trailer has been released. This time it concentrates on objectives.
- Fear 3 has been delayed until June
- Interested in Battlefield’s sound? You might enjoy this podcast.
- Trackmania 2 is getting a closed beta in July. It looks awesome.
- Minecraft has sold 2m copies! Grats Notch.
- Darkspore is getting released on Steam tonight.
In more localised news, I feel full, and slightly nauseous. The kind men behind Mythos sent the office a huge cake to celebrate tomorrow’s release, and we’ve eaten a lot of it. What’s the best cake in gaming? No – you’re not allowed to say that one.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Why won't Maxis let me play with its best toy? The awesome, Play-Doh-like Creature Creator that powered the wacky player-made monsters of Spore is a shadow of its former self in Darkspore, a loosely-affiliated hack-and-slash action RPG spin-off of Will Wright's evolution game. The modification you can do to your characters at the loot-equipping screen (which is essentially a crippled version of the Creature Creator) is limited to G.I. Joe-like functionality that only allows manipulation of accessories on 25 playable "hero" monsters that someone else already enjoyed the fun of creating. Being locked out of its creative power baffles me. Let's pretend that we don't know what we're missing, though, and critique Darkspore's colorful hack-and-slash gameplay for what it is: mildly entertaining with a lot of good ideas, most of which go awry.  Take that, giant ugly pile of hitpoints! The big idea is its best: instead of controlling a single hero, you can instantly swap between a team of three cartoony-looking heroes, each with its own set of powers and distinct health and energy pools, and each contributing one power that any team member can use. I quickly assembled a team of heroes with powers I liked, led by Arborus, the self-healing, plant-based tank who grows to several times his size as long as I maintained a steady stream of kills with his club. I even customized his accessories as best I could to make him my own.  Ability effects sure are flashy. Chain gang Darkspore then goes out of its way to sabotage this by treating Arborus like a piece of walking loot, encouraging me to swap him out by unlocking new heroes as I leveled up. I wasn't forced to, but it's the only way to get new powers. Disposable heroes make customization feel futile, and I soon stopped bothering to learn their names—they were just Robot Guy or Plasma Dog-Thing to me. Four-player co-op is definitely the best way to play—you're constantly wading through waist-deep swarms of bizarre enemies with interesting abilities, and there's always someone there to come to your rescue. There's a very clever system for "chaining" levels together, letting you risk the loot you've earned in a mission for the chance to win much better loot by taking on increasingly difficult levels without dying. Long chains are only practical to attempt in co-op, so it's a strong incentive to be social, and it gives you a reason to replay the non-randomized map layouts. The lobby system and friends list make it easy to team up, too, but I'm annoyed there's no offline mode for solo play. Server delays make jumping in and out of the character editor tedious, and you can't pause even in single-player.  It's virtually impossible to tell the heroes from the monsters. PvP is in there too, but it's rudimentary—1v1 or 2v2 matches are just slug-fests in a small arena. The triple-hero system gives it an extra dimension, but unless you save your best hero for last you're unlikely to come back from losing a hero first. Darkspore just leaves me asking questions. Why can't I build my own hero? Why can't I trade loot with other players? Why are heroes vulnerable to extra damage from enemies of the same type (e.g. robots) but enemies aren't vulnerable to damage from heroes of their type? Why does this cartoonish game take itself so seriously, telling a downer story about an ancient race that was wiped out by its own creations? Can Maxis fix the glitches? And what were they thinking? 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Last week, I had a chance to speak to Bethesda Softworks Game Director Todd Howard about their new, massive RPG, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. Before I did, I asked the PC Gamer community on Twitter for questions. They responded quickly, with dozens of great questions about horsies, dragons and terrible voice acting. We’ll have a full interview with more quotes in the coming weeks, but using the information gathered from the presentation and my conversation with Howard afterwards, I’ve answered your questions below. Imperial Creed: Have Bethesda hired more than four voice actors this time? Yes, thank goodness. “It used to be an issue with disc space,” says Howard. “On Oblivion we were literally running out of room on the disc for voice. We’ve since solved that. There are better compression techniques, so we’re not really limited by the physical media as much as how long it takes to record it.” They’re spending more time and money on it this time around. The voice actors are better, there’s more of them, and they’re working with more voice directors in Hollywood this time around. In the presentation I saw, that showed in in your conversations. 
BigTomHatfield: “Are there any ideas from the modding community for Morrowind and Oblivion that have influenced the design of Skyrim?” Yeah, the Oblivion mod “Better Bows”. It made arrows more powerful, more likely to kill in a single hit, and balanced it by making it slower to draw the arrow back in the first place. Skyrim takes that pretty much wholesale, and the demonstration we saw had a lot of bow and arrow action. CrisisXVII: Can the player ride a dragon? Sadly not. There might be something “on the edge of that,” said Howard during the presentation, but it’s unlikely to fulfil your Neverending Story dreams. TheRealJefe: Will there be horse armor again? And will we have to, gleefully I might add, pay for it? It’s not even confirmed yet if there will be horses. They’re in there just now, but “horses have come a long way in games” since Oblivion, said Howard, and they want to make sure they’re good. Pete Hines, Bethesda’s Vice President, did joke that, “If there’s no horses, what will we sell armour for?” Chico_Arazi: Will Levelling work like in Oblivion? Will monsters scale up? /hopes it doesn’t Levelling works like it did in Fallout 3, not like in Oblivion. That means that some areas will scale, some areas won’t, and the level of enemy’s in each area will be fixed in place when you first visit that part of the world. 
timdungate: Skyrim’s mod support. How will it be? Skyrim is being powered by what Bethesda are calling the Creation Engine, and on launch day or shortly after they’ll release the Creation Kit. It should give modders all the tools they’ve become used to from previous Bethesda games like Oblivion and Fallout. Batsphinx: Can you kill a horse on top of a mountain and watch its broken body tumble down for hundreds and hundreds of metres? Assuming horses are in the game at all, yes, but the mountains look considerably steeper than anything in Oblivion. Expect your faithful steed to fall fast, sicko. UberSprode: Will your inventory be able to show more than 3 items at once? And actually be made with the PC in mind? Yes, more than three, though they’re certainly not focusing on simply jamming more things on the screen at once. Skyrim’s new inventory is designed to be slicker than that, and there are a few cool things about it. The first is that every item in your inventory is shown as a 3D model, which can be zoomed in on and rotated. It’s a nice, flashy bit of design that shows off the detail the art team are pouring into the items and weaponry. Which would be fine in itself. But in the dungeon we were shown, the player solved a puzzle by studying an item in his inventory for a set of symbols needed to unlock a door. You can also bookmark spells and items in your inventory you use regularly, making them easy to find even when you’re encumbered by pockets stuffed with calipers. 
ballyhewe: What kind of supercomputer will their new game engine require to run smoothly? It’s designed to run on an XBox 360, so any even vaguely modern PC will run it just fine. If you do have a beastly PC though, you’ll be able to enjoy higher resolution, bigger textures, and all the other lovely features you’ve come to expect. If you’re running DirectX 11, you’ll get some performance gains, but their desire for “parity of performance” across all platforms prevents them from using any of its unique features. Still, the game will be best on PC. altfuture: Are dungeons as repetitive as they were in Oblivion? Oblivion’s dungeons were mostly designed by just two level designers. Skyrim has eight or nine, and while the dungeon we saw had plenty of the same rocky tunnels we’ve come to love, they also had moments of real beauty. We’ll have more on The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim in PC Gamer UK issue 227, on sale May 11. 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Last week, I had a chance to speak to Bethesda Softworks Game Director Todd Howard about their new, massive RPG, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. Before I did, I asked the PC Gamer community on Twitter for questions. They responded quickly, with dozens of great questions about horsies, dragons and terrible voice acting. We’ll have a full interview with more quotes in the coming weeks, but using the information gathered from the presentation and my conversation with Howard afterwards, I’ve answered your questions below. Imperial Creed: Have Bethesda hired more than four voice actors this time? Yes, thank goodness. “It used to be an issue with disc space,” says Howard. “On Oblivion we were literally running out of room on the disc for voice. We’ve since solved that. There are better compression techniques, so we’re not really limited by the physical media as much as how long it takes to record it.” They’re spending more time and money on it this time around. The voice actors are better, there’s more of them, and they’re working with more voice directors in Hollywood this time around. In the presentation I saw, that showed in in your conversations.
BigTomHatfield: “Are there any ideas from the modding community for Morrowind and Oblivion that have influenced the design of Skyrim?” Yeah, the Oblivion mod “Better Bows”. It made arrows more powerful, more likely to kill in a single hit, and balanced it by making it slower to draw the arrow back in the first place. Skyrim takes that pretty much wholesale, and the demonstration we saw had a lot of bow and arrow action. CrisisXVII: Can the player ride a dragon? Sadly not. There might be something “on the edge of that,” said Howard during the presentation, but it’s unlikely to fulfil your Neverending Story dreams. TheRealJefe: Will there be horse armor again? And will we have to, gleefully I might add, pay for it? It’s not even confirmed yet if there will be horses. They’re in there just now, but “horses have come a long way in games” since Oblivion, said Howard, and they want to make sure they’re good. Pete Hines, Bethesda’s Vice President, did joke that, “If there’s no horses, what will we sell armour for?” Chico_Arazi: Will Levelling work like in Oblivion? Will monsters scale up? /hopes it doesn’t Levelling works like it did in Fallout 3, not like in Oblivion. That means that some areas will scale, some areas won’t, and the level of enemy’s in each area will be fixed in place when you first visit that part of the world.
timdungate: Skyrim’s mod support. How will it be? Skyrim is being powered by what Bethesda are calling the Creation Engine, and on launch day or shortly after they’ll release the Creation Kit. It should give modders all the tools they’ve become used to from previous Bethesda games like Oblivion and Fallout. Batsphinx: Can you kill a horse on top of a mountain and watch its broken body tumble down for hundreds and hundreds of metres? Assuming horses are in the game at all, yes, but the mountains look considerably steeper than anything in Oblivion. Expect your faithful steed to fall fast, sicko. UberSprode: Will your inventory be able to show more than 3 items at once? And actually be made with the PC in mind? Yes, more than three, though they’re certainly not focusing on simply jamming more things on the screen at once. Skyrim’s new inventory is designed to be slicker than that, and there are a few cool things about it. The first is that every item in your inventory is shown as a 3D model, which can be zoomed in on and rotated. It’s a nice, flashy bit of design that shows off the detail the art team are pouring into the items and weaponry. Which would be fine in itself. But in the dungeon we were shown, the player solved a puzzle by studying an item in his inventory for a set of symbols needed to unlock a door. You can also bookmark spells and items in your inventory you use regularly, making them easy to find even when you’re encumbered by pockets stuffed with calipers.
ballyhewe: What kind of supercomputer will their new game engine require to run smoothly? It’s designed to run on an XBox 360, so any even vaguely modern PC will run it just fine. If you do have a beastly PC though, you’ll be able to enjoy higher resolution, bigger textures, and all the other lovely features you’ve come to expect. If you’re running DirectX 11, you’ll get some performance gains, but their desire for “parity of performance” across all platforms prevents them from using any of its unique features. Still, the game will be best on PC. altfuture: Are dungeons as repetitive as they were in Oblivion? Oblivion’s dungeons were mostly designed by just two level designers. Skyrim has eight or nine, and while the dungeon we saw had plenty of the same rocky tunnels we’ve come to love, they also had moments of real beauty. We’ll have more on The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim in PC Gamer UK issue 227, on sale May 11.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The self-proclaimed “King of Shooters” has commissioned a portrait to celebrate the marriage of Prince William and Catherine Middleton. Portrait artist Frank Frid created the piece, entitled “Untitled: I'm So Awesome, I Don't Even Need To Name It.” It’s due to be unveiled just before the couple’s special day. According to a 2K press release it took 350 hours to paint and was created in a single day. One of those facts is false. Click more to see the full image.
The portrait will eventually become part of the official Duke Nukem Forever launch celebrations. 2K/Duke have also created a limited run of 200 signed prints that will be used to raise money for charity. Duke Nukem Forever will be released in the UK on June 10, and June 14 in the US, but what are you planning on doing this Friday? We’re having a LAN party. With bunting. 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Blizzard have deployed patch 4.1 and a few respective hotfixes for World of Warcraft. The latest patch features a new level 85 Stranglethorn quest line, updated dungeons, all-new gear, rare mounts, pets, and some odd-sounding tweaks like this: “Gag Order now applies to Pummel and Heroic Throw”. Click more for details and a new trailer.
If you think your finger is strong enough, scroll down the page of patch notes. We also recommend you get yourself a warm drink and settle in a comfy chair before clicking. Dungeon Finder: Call to Arms will help streamline the Dungeon Finder tool by offering incentives to the less popular roles. The new Guild Finder tool will help players looking for some new friends. But you don’t need to worry about that right? Guild Challenges are also new. Guild groups can gain additional experience, achievements and gold, though there’s a limit to how many times you can complete each challenge per week. As promised, here’s the latest trailer:
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The sun-bleached canyons, the cars polished to within an inch of their MOTS, the cunning use of the word “Turbo” 47 seconds in. As pointed out by RTS, there’s plenty of reasons to get excited for Trackmania 2, even though there’s no confirmed release date as yet. For more on Trackmania 2, read our full preview in issue 227 of PC Gamer UK, on sale now. 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Creative director of Microsoft Game Studios, Peter Molyneux, has confessing his love for Notch’s indie hit, Minecraft. Read on for the details.
Speaking exclusively to PC Gamer a few weeks ago, Molyneux said, Notch’s indie is “One of the greatest innovations I’ve seen in gaming in the past ten years… Minecraft breaks all the rules of a game; it’s got a very hard learning curve at the start, there’s no leveling up, there’s no mission structure, there’s no experience, there’s very few measurable things in there and yet it’s hugely successful.” The lead designer of the Fable series also admitted that he’s “Probably played more Minecraft over the last three months than any other game.” Fable 3’s PC release date has just been confirmed as May 17. Thankfully, it’s ditching Games For Windows Live exclusivity and will now also be available on Steam and as a boxed version in real-life “stores”. Read the full report in PC Gamer UK issue 227 – on-sale now. According to Molyneux, developers can sometimes be throttled by the forumulaic nature of modern game design: “I have these conversations with people all the time, they’ll say “What are the core pillars of the game?” What are the first five seconds of enjoyment?”, “What’s the levelling up score?” It’s as if they’ve got a bible of design which your game has to fit into and quite clearly things like Minecraft don’t fit into that at all.” 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Gamers looking for a custom gaming rig, but who don’t want to build it themselves (shame on you) have a new, super-convenient option. iBUYPOWER is partnering up with one of the largest retail chains on the planet, Wal-Mart, to bring custom PCs to the masses. The interface to pick and choose your parts on Wal-Mart’s site is super simple, but so is some of the selection. Check out the options available on their site right now. You get to pick from 5 different cases, an AMD or Intel processor, 3 different hard drive options, a graphics card (both Radeon and GeForce options are up for grabs), 3 different types of optical drives (including Blu-ray), and 3 different forms of Windows 7. Optional parts include card readers, monitors, and printers. All the systems start at $580 and the price increases depending on the parts you buy. So what do you think? Would you consider building your next PC as a blue-light special? 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | We were expecting the first episode of the Jurassic Park adventure game to drop into our laps any day now, but instead we’ve received a press release announcing that the game is being delayed until further notice. The note from Telltale CEO Dan Connors indicates the game will change somewhat from the quicktime-event heavy affair it was when we first saw it a while back, throwing around terms like “moving in new directions” and promising that the revised game will have mechanics and storytelling “beyond anything you’ve seen from us before.” If you’d already pre-ordered the game, Connors promises a full refund within the next few days plus a free Telltale game of your choice. Not a bad way to smooth things over, all things considered. Read on for the full text of Connors’ apologetic letter.
I’d like to thank you for your continued support of Telltale Games and in particular for pre-ordering Jurassic Park: The Game for the PC. We expect 2011 to be big year for us with lots of exciting changes ahead and we couldn't be doing it without the support of great customers like you. With Jurassic Park: The Game, in particular, we are moving in new directions, expanding our game mechanics and pushing our storytelling beyond anything you've seen from us before.
Our goal was to release the first episode of Jurassic Park: The Game this month, and currently we are very excited about how the game’s creation is progressing. The game’s mechanics and storytelling have come together in such a way that we see great potential, so much so that we feel we can push these elements to the next level if we spend some extra time working on them. It is because of this that we are delaying Jurassic Park: The Game on PC to ensure PC players get the best possible gaming experience.
We'll be investing the extra time into making the game great and it will be released simultaneously on every platform this fall. We regret any disappointment on the part of our fans but we are confident you'll be pleased with our decision when the game comes out.
This has been a hard choice for us, but it is the right decision. To thank you for your continued support of Telltale and for your pre-order for Jurassic Park: The Game we are going to issue you a 100% refund. In addition to your refund, we are also giving you your choice of any Telltale game free of charge because you are important to us. We will begin issuing the refunds over the next couple of days and will reach out to you with information via email on how to get your free game.
Sincerely,
Dan Connors
Chief Executive Officer
Telltale Games
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | League of Legends fans know the cycle well: every two weeks, a new champion is released, kicking off a complex chain of events filled with various personalities. Most people are usually fairly excited (try to think back to the last time the servers weren’t totally slammed on patch day—pretty much never). You’ve got the diehards, who make sure that they save up 6300 IP every 14 days to ensure that they can afford the new champ the exact second that they’re released. You’ve also got the theorycrafters, who are already trying to figure out how overpowered the next champ can be and the best item/rune combinations to use with them. On the opposite end of the spectrum, of course, you’ve got the haters. These are the guys that feel the need to troll every thread everytime a new champion is released, complaining that they want to play new maps. Or how they think the new champ will be OP. Or that not enough, or too many, female champions get released. Or that balance suffers as Riot adds more champions. Whatever camp you fall into, champion release days can be quite the polarizing experience. But what about the devs at Riot Games? What’s their take on the champions that they’ve consistently released twice a month? We asked them, and they had some very interesting answers.  There's no denying that Ezreal is a ton of fun. Recently, we got the chance to speak with two of Riot’s head honchos: Marc Merrill, the president, and Travis George, one of LoL’s producers. Picking their brains on what they consider the best champion releases is intriguing—but let’s step back for a second. What about the rate at which champs are released? Merrill’s decided that “two weeks is a good cadence… what matters most to us is [keeping] players engaged and excited.” Part of that process is constantly giving players something to look forward to, and that includes new champions. “The question we always ask ourselves is: what’s the most fun champion we can make?” says George, who’s been much more involved in the hero creation process in 2011 than previous years. What, then, defines a fun champion? Merrill’s convinced that, as the game continues to evolve, uniqueness is more important than fine-tuning balance as champions are pushed to live servers. “The most important element to creating a great character is having a very clear and well-defined theme,” he said. Merrill views Shaco as a good example: the creepy jester is all about sadistic trickery and the “clown gone bad” vibe. Merrill describes the champion design process as “highly collaborative… we try to [eliminate] people’s preconceived notions.” If Shaco’s a dev favorite, what about the post-launch champions? When asked which champion launches he’s most proud of, Merrill lists Ezreal, Nidalee, and Renekton. It all comes back to uniqueness: Ezreal and Nidalee enable totally new playstyles unlike any other champion, focusing on constant, fluid mobility and poking from a distance. Renekton’s fury mechanic, as well as the ninjas’ energy mechanic, also please Merrill, as he enjoys any champion that lets you experience something apart from the norm.  George also includes Caitlyn as one of 2011's best champions. George’s answer to the “most successful champion launch” question is much more controversial. At the time of the interview, George felt that every champion released thus far in 2011 was spot-on. “Karma was very popular for support,” George said. “Support overall is just not played as much as the other archetypes, but I feel like we executed really well what Karma is. We don’t feel like she’s game-breaking; we feel like she’s got a unique, iconic look and theme, and she’s fun and interesting to play for people who enjoy support.” Say what? Many a Summoner might beg to differ with George’s take; I personally haven’t seen more than two Karma players since the week of her release, and neither of them seemed to contribute much to the team. But George stood his ground, saying “I feel like we executed all our champions [in 2011] well… We always look back on the previous champions and ask ourselves, ‘How did that go, what did we learn, what are we gonna do next time, what did we do awesome?’ And I really feel that we’re [on a roll this year.]” But what about the gargantuan elephant in the room: Magma Chamber, the additional map that was revealed in our magazine last year before Riot went silent on its progress? “We learned a couple things from [designing] Magma Chamber,” says George. “[For one,] we have a really high internal standard for quality.” George admits that Riot may have jumped the gun with prematurely unveiling Magma Chamber, and the team feels guilty for getting players’ expectations up long before they could deliver on their promises. “We probably feel the pain [of Magma Chamber still being unreleased] far more than anybody else does,” says Merrill. “We’re our [own] harshest critics.” As for upcoming champions, Merrill told us that they definitely want to add more “true tanks,” though they tend to be the most powerful champions (I’m looking at you, Shen), so they require more tweaks and testing. Whaddya say, Summoners? Have Riot’s brightest minds assuaged your fears, or fueled your flames? Do you agree with Merrill and George’s takes? And what’s up with Karma getting praised? 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Power to the internet. It only took about 30 minute of complaining for Notch to completely change his Minecraft mod plans. Tom’s Black Ops: First Strike review didn’t have quite the same effect, and that’s been up for days. Weird. But enough about the internet. Click more for today’s bonus links.
- A Brink tutorial trailer has just appeared on Splash Damage’s YouTube channel:
- A talking Portal turret plushie? Yes please.
- This is dumb, but amusing.
- Look at the amazing physics behind Wolfire’s upcoming Lugaru HD. Rich claims to love animals, but seems slightly aroused by that video. Hmm.
- Aww. Turns out PS3’s and PC’s aren’t actually that good friends after all. Very sad. (via reddit)
- Lord of the Rings Online’s European servers will now be controlled by Turbine, not Codemasters Online Gaming.
In office news, Rich managed to manipulate enough glitches to win a few games of Nidhogg at lunchtime. We don’t know whether it was born from hacker’s guilt or misplaced pride, but this tweet appeared mysteriously soon after. Normal service will be resumed tomorrow. 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Graham has just pointed out this intriguing indie MMO. According to Software Engineering, Shores of Hazeron is the “Biggest, most realistic and most useable science fiction galaxy that has ever been attempted.” The devs are making lots of bold claims that have never been claimed before.
The team have devoted years to their bespoke engine: “We took a new approach. No off-the-shelf 3D engine was used… pick a direction and start to walk, or swim, or fly a riding beast or ride a dirt bike. At best you’ll circle the globe and return to your starting point.” You’ll get to create your own ship from scratch, pack it full of your space mates and engage other players online, all while you develop your own empire. The graphics are looking a bit, well, “basic” at present, but the developers insist that “more and more” of their efforts are getting directed towards “graphical beauty, stability and performance… Shore of Hazeron is about to bloom.” Hyperbole or not, it’s definitely intriguing. Visit the official site for more info, and to sign up. Let us know how you get on in the comments. 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Notch has unveiled plans for supporting Minecraft mods in the future. Players will need to sign up as a “mod developer” to download the source code and create their own mods. Originally, Notch posted that each team would need to pay a fee for the privilege, but due to “overwhelming feedback” the license will now be released for free. Read on for the details.
Notch originally specified that “The cost of signing up makes sure that only serious developers gain access” to the certificate. People weren’t happy about that. Later Notch attempted to defuse the wrath of the internets by highlighting that: “The access cost won't be prohibitively expensive and if you make a good mod or something else based on the source code, it's highly likely we will want to license it.” But the internet was EXTREMELY ANGRY. Notch updated his blog with another post saying “Because of overwhelming feedback, the cost of the mod api access will be 0 dollars. Our intention wasn't to make money off selling the access, only to ensure some level of quality. Obviously that wasn't the most popular idea in the world. ;)” He the asked if he could “Go back to working on the maps now?” Notch’s earlier post included a few more specifics. Whether these will be changed to reflect the pricing change is yet to be confirmed: - Mods must only be playable by people who have bought Minecraft
- You can't sell your mods or make money off them unless you've got a separate license deal with us
- The mods must not be malicious (obviously)
Despite the freedom, Mojang will still retain the right to take mod ideas and implement them into Minecraft. According to the developer that’s “To prevent the situation where we have to avoid adding a feature just because there's a mod out there that does something similar. It's also great for dealing with bug fixes provided by the community. It's possible we might have a mod marketplace for selling and buying mods that fans have written, or we might purchase and integrate nice mods that fit the main theme of Minecraft.”
Do you love Notch as much as Tim? Prove it. He’s bought him a (real-life) beer, and describes him as a “beardy Minecraft genius.” 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | THQ and Games Workshop have announced that their licence agreement will be extended. It basically means that THQ can continue to create games that are packed full of Space Marines and Orks spelled with a “K”. THQ have had relative success with the license so far. We awarded Dawn of War 2: Retribution 88 in our review. Tom has written a preview about the upcoming Space Marine too; you can read that here. What would you like to see THQ create with the 40K licence? 
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Our May issue is now on-sale in both physics-based shops and our online one, where it’s £5.99 with free postage to anywhere in the UK. Truly, it’s a small price to pay for a magazine with a picture of a red-headed female bounty hunter from Star Wars: The Old Republic on the cover. That’s for Tom’s huge preview of the swords-and-Forcery MMORPG: he played the game for a ridiculous two days, as both the Bounty Hunter class and the Imperial Agent, and he has some opinions to tell you. Elsewhere in previews, Rich has slain or at the very least slewn the forces of Chaos in Relic’s first blockbuster action game: Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine. And Tim’s had an extensive play of Guild Wars 2 and wants to tell you about how its ambitious dynamic world works in practice. Meanwhile, our team of imaginary-battle-hardened critics review Crysis 2, Homefront, Shift 2: Unleashed, and the belated PC version of Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood. Which is now free of the preposterous DRM Ubisoft put on the last one, by the way. In Extra Life, we’ve got a guide to being better at Call of Duty: Black Ops multiplayer, reflections on the genius of Dawn of War: Dark Crusade, a report on the furry additions to City of Heroes, and tales of what we’ve been up to in Bulletstorm and Shogun 2: Total War, amongst much else. If you like games, buy this magazine about games. If you like this magazine about games, subscribe to this magazine about games – it’s pretty cheap. And if you hate paper, subscribe to the digital edition to get it cheaper still. 
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