Obsidian are working on a South Park RPG, Trey Parker and Matt Stone are heavily involved
Someone on the NeoGAF forums have gotten their mits on the South Park edition of Game Informer and have released details on the upcoming South Park-themed RPG. The RPG will be the first game that South Park duo Trey Parker and Matt Stone have directly participated in, where they've written the script and dialogue.
Obsidian will be using the Dungeon Siege III engine and have developed a dynamic lip-syncing tool to accommodate changes in the script. Parker and Stone have given an astonishing 15 years of assets to Obsidian to make the game with. For full details, check out the insane list below:
Basics
-The first game Parker and Stone have directly participated in, writing the script and the dialogue.
-Parker has always preferred silent protagonists in RPG's, so the player's character will be silent.
-The player's character will be fully customizable.
-Your character has a smartphone that acts as the primary game menu and has a facebook-like app show the number of friends you have and your current standing with the various kid factions.
-There are five classes, which are wizard, paladin, adventurer, rogue, and a fifth unannounced class.
-Obsidian is using the Dungeon Siege III engine.
-Obsidian developed a dynamic lip-syncing tool to accommodate changes to the script.
-Parker and Stone gave Obsidian 15 years of assets used during the show and a detailed list of approved textures and colors.
-Critical hits, cash rewards, experience, and consumables are in the game.
-Parker hates unskippable cutscenes.
-The humor will be more focus on the games they have played in the past but Parker mentions that games have lampooned other games before so they don't want to do exactly that instead they are focusing more on RPG's on how big and bombastic they can get sometimes.
Story
-The player will play as the new kid in town, the main theme of the game is fitting in and being accepted.
-The story begins with your character participating in a live action role-playing game that the neighborhood kids started, which eventually evolves into a real adventure.
-Eric Cartman will greet your character and help you decide your class, which are wizard, paladin, adventurer, rogue, and a fifth unconventional class made up by Cartman.
Combat
-Many elements of the combat system are like Paper Mario and the Mario & Luigi games.
-If player initiates combat they will attack first and vice versa.
-X button is for melee attacks, pressing it in well-timed succession will result in multiple hits.
-Timed inputs occur for defense as well for reduced damage.
-Obsidian doesn't want the player to have to sit and watch animations play out; they're incorporating dynamic camera angels at certain times, such as a Ro Sham Bo attack that stuns an enemy.
RPG
-Enemy encounters are visible on the map.
-Soda are health potions and Tweak's coffee is a haste item.
-There are melee and ranged weapons, as well as a lightning powered Okama Gameshpere that is a magic item.
-There is a Final Fantasy Materia like system in the game to augment weapons with various abilities like fire, poison, and electricity.
-There is a Summon System but they are not able to talk about it.
Collectibles
-There are collectibles to look for in the environments, some appear throughout the game while other are in specific areas.
-An example of a collectible is a Chinpokomon doll and a magazine, Chinpokomon dolls are not all the same model Obsidian are using various models that appeared in the episode.
Other
-When Obsidian were first coming up with ideas they show Parker and Stone a quest where you go into a cave and fight a giant bat boss that Ike is riding on, Parker and Stone said that the quest wasn't Southpark, that it was a generic video-game. Parker and Stone then mention a quest to get Kung Pao Chicken from City Wok, to readjust Obsidian focus.
-When they start making the town hub Parker and Stone realized that they did not have a true layout for the town, so they had fun figuring out where everything went.
-There will not be any platforming, they tried jumping early on but it didn't seem right.
-They talk about how they have had to scrap level because the perspective wasn't right because everything is hand illustrated and hand animated.
-They talk about the challenges of making a comedy driven game, Portal 2 is mention, they say if Portal 2 dialogue was on top of a shitty game it wouldn't be as good, so they want to make a game that is as good as the dialogue.
Concept Art (Massive Spoilers!!!!)
-The first concept art is a 'Gnome Mine' a concept, my guess underpants gnomes.
-The second concept art is 'UFO Crash Site', it shows Kenny, Cartman, Stan, and Kyle in front of a military fence with a UFO further away in a forest surround in mountains.
-The third concept art is a 'Gnome/Crab People D.M.Z.' label as a rough concept, it show a border fence with gnomes on one side and Crab People on the other side.
-The last concept art is 'Christmas Town' a concept.
Interview with Trey Parker and Matt Stone
-Parker and Stone really enjoy rpgs and they do think that rpgs are the best fit for southpark.
-They were asked of how making a rpg story differs for an episode, they say that the learning curve was be bigger than anything they have done other then their Broadway musical.
-Visual and Visual style seen in episodes like "Good Times With Weapons", or the live action hamsters in "Pandemic" will not be in the game they want to keep a simple 2D style.
-Parker has been a lifelong gamers, he really likes rpgs because he like the singleplayer nature of them so he doesn't like or get MMO's. His favorite game is Oblivion. Also he has completed every Zelda game.
-Matt when he was young used to play the old Infocom game and Wizardry and likes open world games like Arkham City, Infamous, Grand Theft Auto, Red Dead Redemption, and also hockey and soccer games. He mention that he is more of a button masher and remember Serious Sam because he likes to shoot shit and blow shit up but he is now more interested in games like Arkham City and he hasn't play a RPG in year because he got tired of walking everywhere. His favorite game is FIFA and he mentions getting his ass kick online by kids with English Accents.
-Lastly they joke how this Southpark game will be a cross between Obilivion and FIFA were "you gotta go kill a bunch of monsters and shit but you can only use your feet."
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Faildozer strikes again, Bulldozer actually has 800 million LESS transistors than originally thought
AMD's Bulldozer "FX" series of processors have not enjoyed the lime light lately, where we could replace lime light with poo flinging and we'd be more on the mark. We've covered it a few times now and even our reviewer Shane Baxtor was not that impressed.
This is a bit unusual. I got an email from AMD PR this week asking me to correct the Bulldozer transistor count in our Sandy Bridge E review. The incorrect number, provided to me (and other reviewers) by AMD PR around 3 months ago was 2 billion transistors. The actual transistor count for Bulldozer is apparently 1.2 billion transistors. I don't have an explanation as to why the original number was wrong, just that the new number has been triple checked by my contact and is indeed right. The total die area for a 4-module/8-core Bulldozer remains correct at 315 mm².
How can this happen? I'm really stumped. Absolutely stumped. You could say I've been bulldozed over. Could the 800 million transistors be enabled with the next iteration of Bulldozer? Could it near-double its performance? This is something I'd like to see, a processor that could really stick its yellow and black guns against Intel's Core offerings.Read More ...
Google working on supreme one-day shipping rival to Amazon Prime
Google is reportedly shopping around with multiple retailers and shipping couriers in an effort to create a service that would compete with Amazon's Prime one-day shipping option. Google could even offer same-day delivery on certain items, which would actually be better than Amazon's offering.
Google, according to sources, have pitched the idea to Macy's, Gap and OfficeMax, but none of the aforementioned companies would comment on the story. Amazon Prime launched in the US in 2005, with a flat fee of $79 per year, subscribers could opt for free two-day shipping for $3.99 overnight shipping on millions of items sold on their site.
Additional benefits include access to streaming movies and TV shows at no additional cost as well as access to the Kindle Owners' Lending Library, where Kindle owners could "borrow" books for free for a full month with no due date. Google plan to start a pilot program soon, where they hope to launch the service sometime in 2012.
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Western Digital partially restore production in one factory in Thailand
Good news for once regarding the flooding in Thailand and HDD manufacturers! Western Digital have reportedly restored production at at least one of their HDD manufacturing plants in Thailand one week ahead of schedule.
Much work remains to be done, but we couldn't be more pleased with the effort and results thus far, including tremendous support from our supply partners and customers. The passion, perseverance, ingenuity and execution exhibited by the Western Digital team has been extraordinary and enabled us to make substantial progress in partially restoring our operations in Thailand.
Other operations, however, remain submerged in just under two feet of water, but are expected to be pumped dry within the next we ek or so, after which they'll require decontamination and will need to be refurbished. The clean up operations is said to cost WD something like $50 million, on top of the $225-$275 million in related charges to the flood.Read More ...
ASUS Sabertooth X79 (Intel X79) Motherboard Review
Introduction
While passed over on the Z68 chipset, the Sabertooth has appeared straight away come launch of the X79 chipset and brings with it the "TUF Components" that give ASUS the confidence to strap a massive 5 year warranty onto the board.
While we've already looked at the ASUS Sabertooth X79 in preview form, like our previous ASUS previews there was still a number of things we couldn't tell you. At the same time, we couldn't show you the bundle of the board, so that's something else we'll be showing you today.
So looking at the layout today, there won't be any surprises. We'll start off by looking at the package of the board including what's in the bundle. Once we've done that we'll move onto the motherboard itself and cover a few of the details that we couldn't when we originally previewed the board. From there we'll move onto the BIOS to see what's going on in that department before we take a look at the overclocking capabilities of the board.
The Package
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Super Mario 3D Land Nintendo 3DS Review
For those of you who currently cringe at the thought of 3D gaming on the 3DS due to eyestrain, you should fear not. For us this was the first game we were able to run in full 3D without a problem and it finally seems like the developers are sorting this problem out and it could not have happened for a better game, because it's the 3D style that makes Super Mario 3D Land such an excellent game.
As well as this, the game introduces some new and interesting powerups. The tanooki suit returns from Super Mario Brothers 3 and given the 3D style of the game, fits well. But perhaps the most interesting addition is a box with a propeller on it, allowing Mario to burst into the air and gain even more air if he manages to land on a floating enemy. And in continuing their recent tradition of focusing on the casual gamers, if you fail on a level six times a white tanooki suit becomes available which basically makes Mario invulnerable for the entirety of that level and if you still continue to fail, you get a powerup which will take you right to the flag. This obviously somewhat reduces the challenge of the game, but it's good to see Nintendo still looking after the casuals.
However, once you complete the game you unlock the special worlds and this is where Nintendo really hands hardcore gamers a real challenge. Special Worlds are the Super Mario we have come to know and love and you will die, and die and die again many times before finishing that side of the game. The white tanooki suit is not available in the special worlds which is a clear indication this is where Nintendo wanted the challenge to lie.
The world of Super Mario 3D Land is highly detailed and variable. Some levels are set under the sea, whilst others in the clouds. Each world has a specific theme to it and the challenge ramps up based on this as you progress. One thing that becomes very important in the 3D game is the shadows the objects eminate. These shadows help give you a sense of perspective to the level and to ensure that the 3D does not throw you, in some sections, Nintendo allow you to change the 3D perspective with the DPAD on the fly. And although it's not as impressive, the game is entirely playable with the 3D graphics turned off.
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