No more ATI

Via Bigdownloads:

In 2006, PC processor maker AMD made huge headlines with its acquisition of the ATI PC graphics chip and card business for $5.4 billion. Now, four years later, AMD has decided the ATI brand name has served its purpose and will phase out the use of the ATI brand name later this year.

While the ATI brand is going away, AMD will still retain the Radeon brand for its consumer graphics chips and boards. All of AMD's current graphics products will still have the ATI brand, presumably until they are phased out. According to AnandTech, AMD is also simplifying its brands across the board in 2011 with the Vision name as the only one that will be used for all of its CPU products.

Stardocks Elemental day 0 Patch

Apparently there is a day 0 patch coming for those of you who had pre-ordered Elemental: War of Magic that will bring the game from beta 4 to the retail version. Also important to note is that the multiplayer part of the game will not be enabled until next week. When asked why the delay, Stardock CEO Brad Wardell stated that is development team was exhausted, apparently some retail stores released the game early, forcing his staff to work all weekend to get the patch ready.

This is the 2nd time retail stores have released one of his games early, the first being Gas Powered games Demigod. I think he needs to start planning his launches on Friday, as I'm pretty sure they are doing it on purpose to get the game out for the weekend.

Get the full post with all the updates here

New Dungeon Keeper?

Ridgewood, NJ, August 12, 2010 — Kalypso Media, a global publisher of award-winning PC and console games is pleased to unveil Dungeons, an all new strategy/simulation title for Windows PC which will take players on a devious adventure through the depths of the underworld. Prepare to have the roles reversed as you play a despicable Dungeon Lord whose job is to create fiendish dungeons to lure and trap heroes who dare to try and steal your treasure. Dungeons is currently in development by Realmforge, a Kalypso Media studio and is scheduled for release in Q1 2011.



To be clear, EA is lending out the DK license to some chinese compant to make a crappy MMO, however this looks really close, and Realmforge/Kalypso are exactly the right people to do it.

Im excited.

Torchlight 2 and Starcraft 2

Torchlight 2

Last year developer Runic Games released Torchlight, a hack and slash RPG that plays like a stripped down (but extremely fun) version of Diablo, which makes sense, as the company is made up of ex Blizzard employees.

It's main criticism, however, was the lack of multiplayer co-op. As shown in the trailer, the is about to be corrected. This is starting to remind me of Gauntlet on steroids, which is actually what I have wanted for a while.



This company could also be a good lesson for other start ups that are staffed by former employees of successful studios. With the bar set so high from Blizzards success, rather than try and make "The next Diablo", Runic just stuck with what they knew and made a fun, accessible, and affordable game. It appears Travis Baldree and Max Schaefer aren't making that mistake again.

If only Flagship studios had started the same way, they might not have tarnished themselves with Hellgate London. Oh well, it happens.

Starcraft 2

StarCraft II outsold all non-entertainment PC software, including anti-virus programs, Microsoft Office and more. The Collectors Edition of the game was the sixth best selling PC software product for July. Imagine my shock.

Now that I'm finished moving, hopefully I can play it soon. Alas, a new distributor for my car must take precedence.

L4D2 iron man mod

Left For Dead 2 Iron Man

Possibly the most brutal mod for left for dead 2 is coming out, called Iron Man, Valve adds this description:

No respawns, no restarts, no ammo, all tension!
Did you vote the Mutations are too easy? Try this one on Expert. Realism rules are in effect. There are no respawns in the map. There is no ammo. If your team wipes, you need to restart the whole campaign.

No new IP's from ID

Carmack in response to a question regarding New IP's from id being in the works

Computer and Video Games quotes Carmack as saying, "We do already have more IPs than we can exploit. " id launched the Wolfenstein, Doom and Quake shooter brands, all of which are among the most well known PC gaming franchises in history." Carmack says don't look for id to add to that line up beyond Rage, saying " It's scary to say it, but maybe not in the next decade even, because we want to support Wolfenstein, Doom and Quake - and hopefully we can add Rage onto that."

Nothing new from id, imagine my shock