Need for Speed: ProStreet (NFS:PS) is the latest installment of Electronic Arts’ popular racing game series Need for Speed. On May 21, 2007, Electronic Arts published a teaser trailer of ProStreet, and was then officially announced ten days later on May 31, 2007. It is due to be released worldwide in November 2007.
The demo, featuring two races, one speed challenge and one grip race, appeared on Xbox Live on October 26, 2007, on PlayStation Store on November 1, 2007, and on PC on November 2, 2007.
Gameplay
Need for Speed: ProStreet will take the Need for Speed series in a new direction of gameplay. Instead of an arcade style of gameplay which has dominated the series, ProStreet will focus much more on realism and move closer to, but not into, racing simulation, and still with options to use driving assistants to make driving easier and more arcade-like. Unlike its predecessors, all racing in ProStreet will take place on closed tracks, thus making it the first game in the series not animating illegal racing behaviour, hence there will not be any police in the game. Performance tuning will take up a large part of gameplay in a way that even a small adjustment of the shape of a car’s body will impact its performance. Autosculpt is back from Carbon, but with much greater detail. According to an Electronic Arts employee, there will be thousands of aftermarket upgrades, visual and performance, from real performance brands.
In ProStreet there will be several different game modes, including Drag, Grip, Speed, and Drift. Drag race is simply a 1-mile drag race, the first to cross the finish line wins. Grip race, which is a circuit race, you do whatever you need to do, to cross the finish line first. Block your opponent, ram them, or even smash them off the track. Speed challenge is all about speed and control, you need to pass the checkpoints with highest possible speed, and the racer with the highest total checkpoint speed wins. Drift, you just drift for points.
ProStreet will feature next-generation graphics aiming for a more photo-realistic feel, and more advanced physics. It will also be the first Need for Speed game to include damage modelling since 2000’s Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed. The new damage system is said to be very accurate, as a collision with any object in the game world may render a car damaged or even useless.
Also, in accordance to the fact that Autosculpting any body parts will impact performance, these changes can be tested in an enclosed chamber marked as the “Wind Tunnel”. Your car is placed in the Wind Tunnel and artificial winds are created, giving you your performance on the track. You can use this to tune your car to your liking.
The new ProStreet will also feature an advanced damage system, which will directly impact on your car’s performance, unlike previous Need for Speed titles. This is especially significant in the Speed racing mode, as you can easily “total” your car.
RuneScape is a Java-based MMORPG operated by Jagex Ltd. With over ten million active free accounts and more than one million paid member accounts, RuneScape is rated among the most popular online games in the world. More than five million unique players access their accounts to play RuneScape at least once per month. RuneScape offers both free and subscription content and is designed to be accessible from any location with an Internet connection and to run in an ordinary web browser without straining system resources.
Andrew Gower created DeviousMUD, the forerunner to RuneScape, in 1998. Rewritten and renamed, the first version of RuneScape was released to the public on 4 January 2001. Since its release, the game has been praised for its free-playing abilities and its availability on a web browser.
RuneScape takes place in the fantasy-themed realm of Gielinor, which is divided into several different kingdoms, regions, and areas. Players can travel throughout the gaming world on foot, by using magical teleportation spells or devices, or mechanical means of transportation. Each region offers different types of monsters, materials, and quests to challenge players.
Players are shown on the screen as customisable avatars. They set their own goals and objectives, deciding which of the available activities to pursue. There is no linear path that must be followed. Players can engage in combat with other players or with monsters, complete quests, or increase their experience in any of the available skills. Players interact with each other through trading, chatting, or playing combative or cooperative mini-games.
Empire Earth III, also called EE3, is a real-time strategy computer game being developed by Mad Doc Software and will be published by Vivendi Universal, it is expected to ship sometime in November, 2007. It is the latest installment of the Empire Earth series.
EE3 contains five epochs, fewer than other games in the series but covering roughly the same time period. The game features three factions: Middle Eastern, Western, and Far Eastern. Each faction is comprised of unique buildings, units, and technologies. For example, in the future the Far East will depend on cheaper, weaker, mass-produced units and genetically engineered monsters, the Middle East uses sneaky, hit and run units with technology that enhances the sneakiness of the faction, and the West specializes in more expensive robots and technology.
The three regions also have unique gameplay aspects. For example, the Western region builds using a dedicated builder unit, in standard RTS fashion. The Far East uses any infantry unit to build, while the Middle Eastern building are constructed as vehicles from their City Center, and must then be unpacked at their final destination.
Gameplay
The game is going to introduce several new units and weapons, as well as “A new freeform campaign structure” that “borrows a few pages from Total War – except rather than being constrained to one period, you play across the entirety of history.”
There are three customizable civilizations to choose from which are Western, Middle-Eastern, and Far Eastern. Each civilization can be customized by the player to their choosing. Furthermore, each civilization will feature subfactions based on historical nations(ex. the Far Eastern civilization will contain China and Japan). New nuclear weapons will be available such as a nuclear cannon.Each region will focus on different styles of game play; for example, the Middle East has mobile buildings and the West has powerful, but few units. The game’s World Domination mode will allow players to battle across a virtual earth While playing this mode quests give the player optional tasks to accomplish while conquering the globe. Furthermore,to help simplify the game, Empire Earth 3 has broken earth’s history down to five unique epochs: Ancient, Medieval, Colonial, Modern, and Future.
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is a first-person shooter developed by Infinity Ward and published by Activision for Windows, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360. It will be the eighth installment in the Call of Duty video game series (including expansions), the first not to be set during World War II, and the first to be rated “M” for Mature by the ESRB. It was announced on April 25, 2007, and will be released on November 6, 2007 in North America and three days later on November 9, 2007 in Europe.
Gameplay
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare will introduce a variety of game play styles into the single player campaign completely new to the Call of Duty series. The game moves away from the standard three country-specific campaign style, and allows the plot to play through more like a film style plot with interlaced story lines from the perspective of the player as a member of the US 1st Force Recon and a member of the British 22nd SAS Regiment. There is also a variety of cameo-style missions where you play as various other soldiers such as an AC-130 Spectre Gunship gunner, or as one part of a two man sniper team behind enemy lines in a flashback style mission.
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare will focus on the variation of modern warfare as an infantry soldier by allowing the player to control soldiers in a vast amount of different scenarios, straying away from the constant “at eleven” action of previous Call of Duty titles and allowing for both heavy intensity fire fights and slower paced drama styled intensity. The developer, Infinity Ward, has so far told about a handful of such levels including where the player will be the gunner of an AC-130 gunship and the pilot of a AH-1 Super Cobra helicopter providing air support.
The series’ move to modern warfare has also introduced a variety of new modern weapons and technology to be introduced to the Call of Duty franchise. Such showcased weapons and attachments include M203 grenade launchers, IR laser pointers for use in conjunction with night vision goggles, silenced MP5SD submachine guns, and the FGM-148 Javelin portable anti-tank guided missile among many others.
Plot
A Russian nationalist by the name of Imran Zakhaev is set on returning his homeland to the times of the Soviet Union. Zakhaev knows the United States would never allow this to happen, thus he funds a coup in the Middle East, organized by his ally Al-Asad, to draw attention away from Russia. The two men and their seconds-in-command gain the nickname The Four Horsemen. However, the British and US governments have been monitoring Zakhaev’s activities and discover his real intentions. During the war a stolen Russian Nuclear weapon is launched at the Americans in the Middle East. The story is told from a perspective of a British 22nd Special Air Service Regiment operative in Russia and an American 1st Force Recon operative in the Middle East.
The game also features a flashback mission set 15 years ago in the Chernobyl Zone of Alienation, which features a new incarnation of Captain Price from 22nd SAS Regiment, the only character to appear in both of the first two games of the Call of Duty series. He needs to assassinate Zakhaev, but his mission fails because his Captain is wounded in action and needs to be evacuated from the Zone of Alienation. Whether this new Price will be confirmed to be a relative of the WWII era Price remains to be seen. It is also believed that the assassination attempt left Zakhaev with only one arm.
Game Modes
Free-for-All – Every man for himself.
Team Deathmatch – Use teamwork to kill opposing players and reach score limit.
Team Objective – Domination and Search & Destroy. Capture flags in Domination, with respawning. Destroy and defend objectives in Search & Destroy, no respawning.
Team Tactical – Small team Deathmatch and Search & Destroy.
Search and Destroy – Much like Counter-Strike’s bomb planting mode, there are two teams: attackers and defenders. Attackers try to plant a bomb at one of two bomb sites, and defenders try to defend the bomb sites. If explosives are planted, defenders must defuse them. Players only have one respawn per round. A round is over when all players on one team are killed, or when the bomb explodes or is defused.
Headquarters – A radio spawns somewhere on the map. Your goal is to capture the radio for your team. If Team A captures the radio, they must defend it from being destroyed by Team B. Team A will only have one respawn until the radio is destroyed or the max time limit for the radio is reached. Team B will respawn at set intervals. Team A earns points for every second the radio is held. To capture/destroy a radio, you must stand in the area of the radio. The more players, the faster you destroy it. A new radio spawns when time limit is reached or the radio is destroyed.
Domination – There are flags at certain points around the map. All flags start neutral. Teams battle to hold the most flags. Game ends when the time limit is reached, or the score limit is reached.
Sabotage – Similar to Search and Destroy, only the bomb is neutral and there are objectives located in both teams’ bases. Each team’s goal is to take the bomb and blow up the objective in the enemy’s base. The bomb carrier can fire his weapons, but his position will be announced periodically throughout the game. Also, unlike Search and Destroy, players will have unlimited respawns as opposed to just one per round.
Team Hardcore – Hardcore Team Deathmatch and Search and Destroy. Limited HUD, extra bullet damage, friendly fire on.
Old School – Old School TDM and FFA. No classes. Weapons are pickups, health is increased, and jumps are higher.
Oldcore – Old School pick-ups and jumping. Hardcore limited HUD and extra bullet damage. TDM.
Need for Speed: ProStreet (NFS:PS) is the latest installment of Electronic Arts’ popular racing game series Need for Speed. On May 21, 2007, Electronic Arts published a teaser trailer of ProStreet, and was then officially announced ten days later on May 31, 2007. It is due to be released worldwide in November 2007.
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is a first-person shooter developed by Infinity Ward and published by Activision for Windows, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360. It will be the eighth installment in the Call of Duty video game series (including expansions), the first not to be set during World War II, and the first to be rated “M” for Mature by the ESRB. It was announced on April 25, 2007, and will be released on November 6, 2007 in North America and three days later on November 9, 2007 in Europe.
