Gaming News

Dabs announced today that they will be pulling out of the TradeDoubler affiliate scheme as of Weds 9th February. Here is a quote from the email they sent to all affiliates...

" It is with regret that we need to inform you that as of the 9th Feb until further notice the dabs.com program has been suspended. We hope to resume this program in the future and would like to take this opportunity to thank you all very much for the hard work, time and support that you have put into this. "

This is a blow to DFC as we've bought quite a lot from them through the scheme, and acquired a good number of pizzas from the proceeds.

Valve have released an update to the Source engine to fix a couple of exploits. Hopefully this will allow Trebz to get a few more kills this week as he was clearly being cheated last week :p

Read more at the Steam site.

A few DFs will be playing CS: Source this coming Friday. We've no specific server in mind, so we'll jump on the first one that has the required number of slots and has a decent enough ping. If we find one we like, I'll add it to our Game Servers page for future reference.

Meet on MSN around 7-8pm.

Note that there have been quite a few Steam and CS updates recently, so it might be worth making sure you're updated prior to the game.

Update: the CS night was a great success. Trebz, AngryDaz, Wij (playing under the name of Japseye of Horus), Grendel and Mesmer were present for DFC, plus Absalon and 3epher who are m8s of Trebz. We found a couple of good servers, which have now been added to the servers page for next time.

A new massively multiplayer RPG based on the Star Trek series was announced last year. It is said to be based after the last Next Generation film - Star Trek Nemesis.

For further information on the game, visit the Official FAQ which was published recently.

Following on from yesterday's article, here's a site that might prove useful for those CS tweaks and optimisations - CS.NET Forums.

The General CS Source Forum contains sticky threads to some decent cvar lists for improving fps, graphical quality and network performance. There's also a great FAQ covering many issues.

For all those who enjoyed CS: Condition Zero, CS: Source now has AI bots available following an update via Steam.

According to the information on the Steam website, the bots have much improved behaviour over those in CS:CZ. Aswell as being more tactically aware, they have also been programmed to behave in a more humanlike manner in a crisis, eg running around firing blindly when a flashbang goes off.

If the bots play well in reality, then we may end up using them to fill out a server at the next LAN :)

Following on from last week's post regarding the power requirements of the Nvidia 6800GT card, I am pleased to report that it runs fine on my 400W PSU. A full update can be found in the new Hardware section of the DFC Forums.

After initially recommending that customers equip themselves with a 480W power supply in order to use the new GeForce 6800 Ultra cards, this has now been revised following further testing. A lot depends on the quality of your power supply, and also the number of components drawing power from it in the PC. Nvidia are now suggesting that a good quality 350W supply would be sufficient.

I've got an 256MB Asus 6800GT DDR3 card on order with the intention of running it on a 400W supply from Q Technology - update to follow when I give it a try :)

Read the Gamespot interview with Nvidia on the subject.

Merry xmas from DFC :)

Both BF 1942 ands BF Vietnam have been updated earlier this month. The patches address an exploit that is present in both games. Links to the downloads can be found on our Game Versions and Patches page.

ATI have released a new set of graphics drivers. Games impacted by fixes in the new drivers include Half-Life 2, Counter-Strike, DOOM 3 and Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault.

Bob has confirmed that the next LAN will not be until 2005. It's hoped the new cellar venue will be ready by late January/early February. No expense has been spared on the construction of the new gaming arena, including 6U a rack for all the networking kit, twin 13 amp plug sockets and 100Mbps ethernet ports at every desk, all connected by nearly half a mile of CAT5e cabling.

After a little digging, we've managed to find the classic LAN rhyme from a couple of years ago. 'Twas the night before Easter...

Getting to the end of HL2 is a bit like when you reach the end of Lord of the Rings - you're sad it's over and you want more. HL2 is every bit the worthy successor to the original, carrying momentum all the way through to the end.

The AI of the enemies is much better than the original, although not as good as in FarCry. The AI of your allies is not brilliant - they still always manage to get in your way when you are trying to do something. The animation of the enemy aircraft and the creepers is awesome. The weapons are okay, with the exception of the gravity gun which is superb. Using it to fire saw blades through the heads of the zombies in Ravenholm was most satisfying :)

All in all, this has to be the best single player FPS we've seen. Worth the wait? Very much so.

I've read a lot of things on various forums regarding HL2 and its installation, some good and some bad, but once people manage to start playing, I've not seen a bad word written about it.

My personal experience was that the installation from a retail DVD went fine. I already had an up to date Steam installation, so that bit was not an issue (many people reported issues creating Steam accounts on the day, but that's hardly surprising given the load the servers must have been under). The only bit that took a while was the unlocking of files - that was a good 15-20 minutes. Once that was complete, the game started fine. Note that Trebz found that his installation from DVD failed unless he opted to install CS:Source aswell as HL2. The Valve HL2 Forums have plenty of discussions on installation issues.

So onto the game itself - absolutely superb. I've not got particularly far yet (just got to the bit where your bike thing gets its gun) but the bits I've seen are just great. It has the expansiveness and graphical detail of FarCry but on top of that it's kept the atmosphere of the original HL. The interaction between your character, the AI characters and the objects and scenery is spot on. The ability to pick up and move just about anything on the map meant they could be really creative with the various puzzles throughout the game. It's not just a case of finding hidden buttons or levers anymore. Eg in the sewers, there are a couple of places where you have to move bricks or barrels to weigh down one end of a plank of wood in order to make a ramp for your bike to jump off.

I've not had chance to look at the multiplayer side of it yet, but no doubt will do in due course.

What a top week we have in store, with the releases of both Half-Life 2 and Medal of Honor : Pacific Assault. Both these games have been delayed, and then some more. And in HL2's case, some more again.

However, the wait is now over. More updates to follow when we see the LAN potential of these games.

At last it looks like we have a firm date for the release of Half-Life 2. Vivendi issued a statement saying that the game had gone gold and that a release was earmarked for Tuesday 16th November. This year!

After all the delays and disappointments over the last 18 months, let's hope this time it really happens.

ATI have released their latest driver set - Catalyst 4.10. ATI are now recommending that users install Windows XP SP2 prior to updating their drivers.

You can download the drivers or read what gamers are saying about them on the Blues News Forums.

Ubisoft have made available a new Ghost Recon 2 movie featuring in-game footage with commentary by designer Christian Allen. The game looks good, however it does have more of an arcade game feel than the original.

The movie shows the various vehicles in the game, controlling a fixed gun to take down a helicopter, and calling in an airstrike. Funnily enough, there wasn't a clip of the whole team lying down in the road being pushed along by an APC :)

Download the movie - 25MB from Ubisoft's ftp.

EA have announced that the version 1.2 patch for Battlefield Vietnam is due out today. Details of the patch are as follows:

Bug fixes

• Tank splash damage against light and heavy vehicles now works.
• Minimap sorting order altered so players are visible above the CP flags.
• Performance problems resolved at the temple in HoChiMinh Trail and Cambodian Incursion.
• Repeating napalm sound bug has been resolved.
• The bug with grenades that goes through bridges has been resolved.
• Parachute not opening properly on first key press.
• Missing icon flashes for radio commands resolved.

Balance/gameplay tweaks

• Helicopter pads at main bases will not reload or repair helicopters occupied by enemy players, even after the control point is taken by the enemy. Note that this is determined by the team the player is on, not by the vehicle they are in.
• Mi8 hitpoints reduced from 125 to 100. Rocket reload time increased from 3 to 4.5 seconds.

Read the full release notes at EA.

Update - the patch is now out and can be downloaded from EA.

Valve are making the purchase of Half-Life 2 and Counter-Strike:Source available over the Steam network. Buyers will get CS immediately (assuming they have preloaded it over the past few weeks), and they will get Half-Life 2 as soon as it is released.

The Steam client has been updated to support the various purchasing options.

Read about the offers on the Steam site.