A Long Lost Piece of SpaceMonster History...This page is presented for historical reasons. It is almost a straight dump of a SQL database that used to store the "News" articles on the old SMGN Home Page. SMGN started by offering some online gaming servers, almost entirely First Person Shooters. SMGN stands for "SpaceMonster Gaming Network". The articles here were originally published by several individuals but the login data was stored in a separate database table and, this being a total 10 minute hackjob of a shell script, I didn't get around to correlating the data. Perhaps I will in the near future. For now it's just a bit of nostalgia for those who enjoyed SMGN in it's heyday with game servers as far as the eye could see. And there were a LOT of you, thanks for playing =). A lot of gaming history was made while SMGN was in high gear and it reads like a garden and also a wasteland of the Computer Games Industry from 2000-2001. Here's hoping the SpaceMonster Gaming Network finds a happy home again someday, one with big, fat pipes for hosting big, fat game servers. As long as we're waxing nostalgic here, big shout out to the original Northwest Link (http://www.nwlink.com) for generously hosting SMGN for a few years. Of course most of us worked there <grin> but none of the owners since the ones that allowed SMGN to exist even wanted to support it and in fact forcibly removed it from the network immediately after taking over. Contributors: Rhomboid, CyberRogue, Granite, Brink, Natas, Quato, Proj, and DOH http://www.SMGN.com -Rhomboid
Tuesday, 6 November 2002 |
As you can see we have been tinkering away at creating the new website. Yeah, we're a bit late. We know. That's what happens when reality gets in the way.
Anyway, real life and our jobs are settling down a bit now and we're able to once again redirect some of our attention to the SpaceMonster Gaming Network. The site is definatly far from done. But its getting there. And this time we will do everything we can to prevent another 6 months of distractions. Speaking of which, anyone else disappointed with Y2K? I realize I should be happy that with all the preparations we made for it made certain nothing went down. But it just doesn't sit right with me. I just wish something would have happened just so I could say, "Glad I did all that work so that didn't happen to us." Anyway, just really needed to rant.
We'll be adding some new features as the weeks pass on. If there is something you think we should add, let us know
According to NGWorldStats the SpaceMonster Unreal Tournament Assault, Domination, and Team Deathmatch servers are all ranked in the top ten! Check out http://ut.ngworldstats.com. Before the 402-405 update SpaceMonster UT Team Deathmatch was number one for the quarter! It's back on it's way up along with the Assault Server already at number two for this week. Sweet, huh? Gives you a warm feeling inside... all that fragging. (We won't mention the CTF server, heh - loser.)
Just saw that Digital Extremes has announced its next project and it sounds fairly badass! Here's what the press release has to say.
Digital Extremes evolves the first person action genre by bringing Unreal: Tournament style gameplay into a massively multiplayer persistent universe.
London, Canada, Feb. 11, 2000 - Leading computer game developer Digital Extremes announces its follow-up to the critically acclaimed Unreal: Tournament. Dark Sector is the next step in the first person action gaming experience by blending the intense action elements of Unreal: Tournament with the scope and character evolution of a persistent online universe.
Dark Sector is set in the wake of world devastation, where survivors are scattered throughout the solar system in a vast crumbling network of outposts and space stations. Anarchy reigns as violent factions wage war over limited resources. The remnants of world government have sanctioned bounty hunting in a desperate attempt to control the growing chaos.
Players carve out their destiny in a violent struggle for fortune and fame. Begin your career as a bounty hunter tracking your target from Mars to the moons of Jupiter and then face off in an ice mine on Europa. Or choose the darker path by hunting the law-abiding citizens around you; build an infamous reputation as an assassin, the growing price on your head turning your own friends against you.
Additional key features of Dark Sector:
- Players can band together in formal syndicates, seeking to invade and occupy the multitude of resource fortresses in the game world.
- Challenge Arenas where players can hold grudge matches, wager on matching their skills against others, competing in team battles and ladder matches.
- An advanced Unreal:Tournament engine featuring a new hardware-only renderer exploiting the latest advances in graphics technology such as T&L, skeletal deformation, multi-texturing, inverse kinematics, advanced surface lighting and a myriad of other improvements.
- Space flight gameplay will allow players to travel between space stations and engage in gut wrenching dog fights.
- Dark Sector evolves - new elements will be regularly introduced after the game's debut, enriching and expanding the game experience.
You can check out the rest over at Digital Extremes Site Along with some cool concept art.
*Deep Sigh* And the longing begins again...
I'll be upgrading the servers to the latest version of Half-Life tonight, 1.0.1.6. I'll only do so after I've made local copies available in the Half-Life section of the SMGN FTP site, ftp://ftp.smgn.com/half-life. Hopefully nothing bad will come of it. In case someone recovering from sniffing oven cleaner after a double-lobotomy is reading this: No, this does not affect any of the servers that AREN'T running Half-Life. Duh.
Sigh... <---- never a good sign when beginning an update. 8-B
Valve/WON have adjusted the online authentication in Half-Life/TFC so that you MUST update to version 1.0.1.6 to play on the internet. As mentioned earlier today SMGN has local copies of the Half-Life patches at:
ftp://ftp.smgn.com/half-life/patches.
Note your current version and download the appropriate patch. For example, if you have the Opposing Force add-on to Half-Life and you haven't updated since then you should see 1.0.1.5 as your current game version.
The SMGN Hunted-Only TFC servers have both been updated to 1.0.1.6. Nobody could use 1.0.1.5 anyway so not upgrading would be fruitless. =P
NOTE: I've heard that some people are having HUGE problems updating using the Auto-Update in the Sierra Utilities that came with Half-Life. The types of problems are varied, I'm betting a lot of it has to do with server congestion. If this IS the case you might be better off getting from a site like ours via FTP anyway.
Just got word from Dru that he's posted an interview with Team Reaction about their upcoming Jailbreak mods for Quake3 and Unreal Tournament. You can check it out over at Dru's Arena.
I'm one of those people who have to have the latest and greatest, so I had to of course rush out and buy Win2K when it was released yesterday. Got it installed and seemed to have no problems initially. Played around with a few graphic programs immediately since I was finally able to take advantage of my Dual Proc.
Everything seemed to be going great with this update. I was shocked to learn that it didn't even wipe LILO from my MBR, taking the pain of having to repair my Linux installation (as I spend most of my time in that environment.) Finally I put my UT cd into the drive looking forward to seeing how well it performed.I waited momentarily as the program loaded up happily watching its splash screen. And then the little box popped up giving me Microsoft's standard verbosity, "Error".
I clicked the ok button expecting to find program crashed. To my amazement the program did not crash on me, it simply would not run in anything but Windowed Mode. Now had I not seen this problem before I would have been cursing Microsoft and hoping for its demise. However, I knew this problem had to do with Voodoo3 drivers not being installed so I went in search of drivers and found a press release stating that they had just sent their drivers off to Microsoft for certification.
This morning new drivers were released, however, they appeared to not be digitally signed. I didn't care. I put installed it anyway....
And they didn't work...
When I brought my machine back up I found myself back in 16 color 640x480 Hell. I went to change the resolution and was denied. So I tried to install the 3dfx tools. Again, denied. Not only denied, denied with the message "You must have a 3dfx video card to install the 3dfx tools." After proclaiming my hatred for 3dfx, I powered down the machine and restarted it hoping that would help. This time 'round not only was I denied from changing the resolution I was the display properties greeted me by spontaneously rebooting. Went through the drill, checked the hard drives, tried again. Again, quick blue screen and I was staring at my BIOS startup.
Which brings me to my plans for the evening. Open up my box (I hate doing that), uninstall the Voodoo3, and put in my new 3D Blaster Annihilator Pro.
BTW... in case anyone is interested... I've got a Voodoo 3500 for sale (it should still be in one piece once I'm finished with it) :)
I recall about about a year or two ago Epic and Monolith had some words involving Engine design primarily in regards to making a scripting language vs. making source code available.
This time around Jason Hall has made some comments that has brought Tim Sweeney out defending Epic's Honor.
Jason's Claim: (paraphrased) Epic feels its game development is more important than its engine licensing.
Tim's Response: This is 100% correct: if we never signed another engine licensing deal, we'd continue on successfully and profitably from our game development business alone. However, if we ceased making games, then who would want our engine? Without our tight game-and-engine development feedback loop, we'd quickly lose touch with the reality of what an engine needs to support a blockbuster hit game. And without a hit game to demo our engine, who'd want to license it? We're not world-class proactive marketers like Jason Hall. :) We just make cool stuff and hope the world recognizes it.
You can read the rest over at the Unreal Technology Page.
UnrealEngine.com has an interview up with Andrew Scheidecker and Gregory Wood talking about their work on UnrealtyEd, a complete C++/UnrealScript rewrite of UnrealEd.
UE: Each of the licensees have taken UnrealEd and modified it to fit their needs, what kinds of modifications were necessary for Unrealty?
Andrew: Mostly increased stability, and an improved interface. An editor that crashed frequently(or at all) wouldn't make a good first impression on the user. Many people have tolerated the instability of the VB UnrealEd, but for Unrealty the editor is a major selling point.
You can check out the rest over at UnrealEngine.com. Its a pretty good read and even has some screenshots of the upcoming editor. I'm definatly looking forward to getting my hands on this one.
SMGN now has a BattleCom server! It might still need some banging on to get it into shape but it's running. To keep it in the family it's presently running with a password. The password is "SMGNROX" for now. I'd just like the people who actually play at SMGN and stop by the web page to have first crack at it. We'll play it by ear after that...
Check out http://www.battlecom.com for more about the program and what you need to get started with it. Once that's squared away you can either find the server on the master server list at the BattleCom site or connect to bcom.SMGN.com. Enjoy!
The Long-Awaited Unreal Tournament Bonus Pack has been released by Epic Games. There are new player models (Skaarj Hybrid, Nali, Nali WarCow), 11 new maps, and the addition of "Relics" which are power-ups that change the abilities/attributes of your player. One Relic reduces damage done to the player by half for example.
The Bonus Pack isn't yet running on the servers but probably will be sometime this weekend. Grab yours today! ftp://ftp.smgn.com/epicgames/unreal_tournament/UTBonusPack.zip
The current map rotations for all the SpaceMonster Unreal Tournament servers have been posted on 'Boidland (http://www.smgn.com/boidland). I know a lot of you have been waiting a long time for this. I appreciate your patience and I never forgot about it. Sorry for the delay.
All of the maps listed there should be available on our FTP site. As new maps are added and old maps are removed the names will be posted there in the future. And as always, if you have map suggestions we'd love to hear them!
Local mirrors of the just-released F.A.K.K. 2 MPEG's are available at ftp://ftp.SMGN.com/movies. One is of Julie Strain, the model used by Ritual for the game character and the voice actress for the movie. The other is an interview with some of the developers and has a bunch of gameplay sequences.
The latest version of Unreal Tournament, 4.13, has been released for public use. There is a local copy available at ftp://ftp.smgn.com/epicgames/unreal_tournament/UTPatch413.exe. The patch will be installed on the servers hopefully by later tonight.
The top three contest winners from the "Make Something Unreal" contest and three other new Assault maps are being added to the SpaceMonster Assault UT server this week. Head over to Boidland for the server details.
None of the current maps are being removed yet. The new maps are all additions to the present lineup and are available on the SMGN FTP site. They will be added at the rate of one or two per day for the rest of this week to avoid incessant moaning and shell shock. =)
I've brought three of the UT servers down to do some badly needed maintenance on them. I did it during the day because it's the only "slow" time as they're very busy. =) We like that. I expect the servers to be back up by later this afternoon barring major disaster...
Just saw this over on User Friendly. Just in case anyone needs a laugh this morning.
The LONG-awaited Rocket Arena Mod for UT has finally arrived. Go grab it from our FTP site (ftp://ftp.smgn.com/epicgames/unreal_tournament/RocketArenaUT.zip) and we'll be working on getting a Rocket Arena UT server up this weekend. Joy!
You can also of course grab it from Fileplanet or any of the other large download sites...
It appears that quite a few companies are banding together to develop a new alternative to DirectX that will run on multiple platforms.
Las Vegas, Nevada. -(National Association of Broadcasters Convention) April 11, 2000 -- Industry leaders including 3dfx, 3Dlabs, ATI, Compaq, Discreet, Evans & Sutherland, IBM, Intel, S3, and SGI today unveiled their collective vision to develop a standard application programming interface for graphics, video, and audio media devices. Creation of a standardized API will allow digital content application developers to more easily integrate video and graphics capabilities into their application suites, and will make these applications more portable over multiple operating systems, CPU architectures, and add-in hardware devices. Similar to the current industry standard for professional 3D graphics- OpenGLÒ , this new API will consist of standard techniques for input and output of digital video and audio data, and will include extensions to OpenGL to support seamless video and graphics integration.You can check out more at Khronos's website
If you haven't already checked it out, Daily Radar has an interview with Dave Georgeson, Sr. Producer at Dynamix. The article talks about some of the new features coming up in the new version of the engine. The article also sports some pretty sweet screenshots so go take a look.
GreenMarine has put up a post concerning the status of UT:RA. Looks like things are getting back on track for the team.
I've been getting nothing but positive feedback about Rocket Arena UT, so I think that I overreacted this weekend :) I perceived the issues to be significant and felt that I couldn't keep the issues snowballing. One severe issue that leads to a fast patch begets more significant issues that require even faster patches. Many people have told me I shouldn't have taken RAUT down, that they think the mod is a lot of fun. I think that taking it down has given the RAUT team time to take a step back and look at things.He also goes into some interface enhancements being worked on. You can check at the UT:RA website.
We've got a team of people together to help test the next release. I think we'll have a version for the testers this weekend and we'll be working on putting together something very bug free. I'm going to rework parts of the interface. My problems with the interface lay in the fact that it wasn't clear to new players that multiple arenas existed, so you had huge waiting lines in the first room.
Gamespot is running a preview of Deus Ex. The article, of course, comes with the gratutitous screenshots. Rhomboid and I were looking at this game earlier today and from what we've seen it looks like System Shock 2 done right. 'Tis looking pretty sweet!
Anybody else curious what Voalition is up to? What ever it is it's looking beautiful.
Inoxx Industries has put up a few new screenshots of the upcoming bonus pack. If you haven't heard about this, check it out. Six new maps, 2 deathmatch and 4 capture the flag including Facing Worlds II the sequel to everyone's favorite sniping map, Facing Worlds.
PlanetQuake has an exclusive about the Quake III Mission pack being developed by Id that will be gracing the Activision booth at E3. This is the first mission pack that Id has actually been the developer on within the Quake trilogy. New maps, new models, new game types and most importantly the nailgun is coming back!
It had been suspected for a couple of weeks but today it was confirmed, Daikatana - the LOOOOONG awaited game from Ion Storm - has finally gone gold and will be in stores soon. The game has been in development for over three years and has taken a lot of flak for many issues related to it's development cycle. We have a local mirror of the demo here at ftp://ftp.smgn.com/gamedemo/dkdemo.exe - Enjoy! After all, you've waited this long... =)
Nvidia has announced the GeForce2! The new graphics card will be bringing the following new features:You can check out the rest of the press release here.Second generation transform and lighting engines Hardware full-scene anti-aliasing (FSAA) NVIDIA Shading Rasterizer (NSR) – multi-operation per-pixel rendering engine Integrated TMDS transmitter supporting flat panels up to 1280 x 1024 Up to 128MB of high-speed double data rate frame buffer memory AGP 4X and PCI support Full support for Microsoft® DirectX® and SGI OpenGL® Optimal performance for current and future CPUs from Intel and AMD
gamespot is now taking applications for the Diablo 2 beta stress test. You will need a Pentium class 233MHz or better with at least 64MB of system memory and a DirectX compatible video card along with various other requirements such as 4XCD-Rom, mouse, MS Os, etc. in order to apply. So you think you’ve got what it takes? Head on over here. They will be accepting applications beginning Monday, May 1 at 10:00 a.m. PT and ending Sunday, May 7 at 9:00 p.m PT.
The UT Inoxx Pack is a pack of 6 maps designed by one of Epic Games' level designers, Cedric "Inoxx" Fiorentino. The maps come in Deathmatch and CTF flavors. Inoxx designed several of the maps that came with Unreal Tournament such as Phobos, Hyperblast, and MetalDream. If you've played UT you've seen his work on these gorgeous levels so the new Map Pack should not disappoint.
You can pick up the Inoxx Map Pack from our FTP site HERE.
I'll fight the urge to install all of them immediately =) but make sure you pick them up soon! I don't know how long I can hold off... (drool...)
Those of you that were lucky enough to get your application for the Diablo ][ stress test in and to be selected as a beta tester should soon be receiving an email with download links. The Diablo ][ stress test was released sometime early this morning. Those that didn't get selected should be happy to hear that the test period is only scheduled to last "a couple of weeks". "The beta is only playable over Battle.net and includes the Barbarian character class and portions of the game's first act."
Looks like we're finally going to see Doom III. John Carmack updated his plan file today discussing Id's decision to produce Doom III and the civil unrest that it created within the company. The casualties... Paul Steed.
Here's the meat of the update.An ultimatum was issued to Kevin and Adrian(who control >50% of the company): We are working on DOOM for the next project unless you fire us.
Obviously no fun for anyone involved, but the project direction was changed, new hires have been expedited, and the design work has begun.
It wasn't planned to announce this soon, but here it is: We are working on a new DOOM game, focusing on the single player game experience, and using brand new technology in almost every aspect of it. That is all we are prepared to say about the game for quite some time, so don't push for interviews. We will talk about it when things are actually built, to avoid giving misleading comments.
It went smoother than expected, but the other shoe dropped yesterday.
Kevin and Adrian fired Paul Steed in retaliation, over my opposition.
Paul has certainly done things in the past that could be grounds for dismissal, but this was retaliatory for him being among the "conspirators".
Yes that's right, Diablo ][ has gone gold as of today with shipping expected as early as the end of June. I've had the chance to beta this bad boy and I have to admit that it has had its toll on my sleeping hours. You can expect the same type of game play as the original Diablo but with better graphics thanks to:"Optional 3Dfx and Direct3D support that offers near-perfect perspective, including scaling and parallax effects, to the game play experience."This wasn't available during the stress test so I am unable to comment on it but it has promise as the 2D graphics that was released to beta testers is lacking in good old fashion eye candy. However the game play and the intrigue of finding rare and magic items, not to mention being able to build your own from various gems is enough to keep you entertained for hours on end. There are players that spend as much time admiring each other's hard earned equipment as they do playing. On that note I'd like to point out that there is a problem with some of the items in that they look alike and can be switched during a trade without you noticing. I had the unfortunate luck to experience this first hand when trading a "perfect Topaz" for a "Gull dagger" the punk switched the "unique" Gull with a normal dagger during the trade without my noticing. Anywho I digress... Head on over to Blizard. to read all of the exciting details!
The Half-Life 1.1 update including the new net code to be real-world tested for Team Fortress 2 will be out at 11:00AM PST. The server updates and dedicated server packages were released today. You can get the HL 1.1 server updates and full versions right here at ftp://ftp.smgn.com/half-life.
Special thanks goes out to radium of FilePlanet and radium Review fame. He uploaded the updates to me because the server at Valve was being royally spanked and was only passing out about 2KB/sec. We're able to offer these mirrors this early because of him. You rock man!
That's right, the long-awaited Half-Life 1.1 update is now out. You can get it here (as a few of you pesky rascals discovered without me even saying anything! =) at ftp://ftp.smgn.com/half-life/10161100.exe.
UPDATE: The full upgrade from any previous version of Half-Life to HL 1.1 is now available as well at ftp://ftp.smgn.com/half-life/hl1100.exe.
For those of you who liked Thief: the Dark Project and some of the other non-orthodox games, there's one coming out 4th quarter this year called Hitman:Codename 47. It's IO Entertainment's first game, and is being published by Eidos Interactive. You play (surprise surprise) a hitman, but like a real hitman, being caught at the scene of the crime by angry guards is not an ideal way to end a hit. Supposedly they've solved some of the problems encountered in game AIs where guards come up to a corpse, yell for a few seconds, then seem to forget all about it. The textures look great. Read all about it at the official site.
Based on the Quake 3 Arena engine, Star Trek: Elite Force places the player on a newly-formed "hazard team" on the starship Voyager from the "Voyager" TV series. The demo includes a training area, a practice mission to a Borg Cube, and a emergency situation on Voyager itself which will take you through a very well-done translation of the television sets of Voyager to the Q3 Engine.
The demo is available at all the usual places and we have a local copy available here at: ftp://ftp.smgn.com/gamedemo/stv_eliteforcedemo.exe.
A demo of "Hired Team: Trial" has been released by New Media Generation. This is not a demo of the finished product and they warn it may still contain bugs. Great claims are made about the net code being able to stay under 3KB/sec and still be smooth which should actually make this game very playable even for 33.6 modem owners if NMG can deliver.
Yep, there's a local copy: ftp://ftp.smgn.com/gamedemo/htttest.exe.
Deus Ex has been out for a couple of weeks now, and I'm sorry to say that I beat it about a week ago. For those of you who don't have people like Rhomboid pointing out all the latest and greatest, Deus Ex is a new first person game from Ion Storm. I'd call it a first person shooter, but that doesn't entirely fit. The game is based on the Unreal engine, so you have the familiar first person perspective, and you pick up plenty of hardware, but there are just too many other facets to this game to call it a straight shooter. For one thing, it's theoretically possible to get through the game with minimal, if any, combat. I say theoretically because there were situations where I frankly didn't see any options short of high explosives. In Deus Ex you play Agent J.C. Denton of the United Nations Anti Terrorist Coalition (UNATCO for short). The mission is similar to that of Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six, except all your mission recon and planning is done on the fly. You also have the advantage of bionic nano augmentation; which is a fancy way of saying you're the six million dollar man. This actually isn't very usefull early on, but becomes vital to success later. You also can customize your character by alloting skill points to various fields of expertize at any time during the game. Have a high enough skill level (there are four) in any one field, and you will see definite advantages in game play. You can also choose which augmentations you want. I found that most of the augmentation canisters had a useful and a not so useful choice. Unfortunately the only way to discover which was which, was to guess. Try it a couple times, and you'll quickly decide which one you picked. The game also changes depending on how you act. Garner a high body count (I did) and certain people at UNATCO just won't like you any more. Conversely others will. This will effect how they interact with you during game play, and even how much they will assist you (the Quartermaster refused to issue me ammunition, as an example). The basic consept is simple enough, but nothing is quite as it seems in a game where they've managed to link almost all the major conspiracy theories and then drop you square in the middle of them. Which brings me to another point. This game is long. About three fourths of the way through, I jumped on line to see if the game actually ended. It does; after taking you to Europe, New York, Hong Kong, and even the bottom of the Ocean. More amazing is the fact that they kept my interest. The maps are large, and there are a lot of areas to explore, few if any are irrelevent to the game, so you don't spend a lot of time wandering around aimlessly. That said, the game doesn't come with any mapping functions, so if you don't have a good sense of direction, there are areas where you will do just that. You can also finish most of the missions with out doing a lot of exploring, but exploring is rewarded with information and equipment that add to the plot, or just plain make life easier later on. I also discovered that just when I thought I knew what was going on, they would introduce a new plot element that forced me to rethink. It wasn't a brain teaser on the level of Myst, but it did keep my curiousity going. The knowledge that there were three possible endings helped too. I've only finished one, but that's primarily because of other newly released titles. If you liked halflife, you'll like the look and feel of Deus Ex. If you were intrigued by the concept of Thief: the Dark Project, but found the gameplay involved a little to much time crouched in the dark, you'll probably find Deus Ex right up your alley. Conversely, if you prefer games that involve little thought, where you can advance through raw firepower alone, you should probably pass it by.
WARNING: This is a biggie
OK. This is a little on the late side, but some of us have to work in order to support our habits. For those of you who don't know, Deus Ex is a new first person game from Ion Storm. You play JC Denton, an agent for the United Nations Anti Terrorist Coalition (UNATCO for short). The concept behind the game is that in the future, terrorism is so rampant that an international coalition has been put together to stop it. To make matters worse, there is an international epidemic of plague which has been nicknamed the Grey Death. Your mission throughout the game is to get to the bottom of the terrorist problem... and incidentally to learn what you can about the Grey Death. Things are not as they seem, and new plot elements are introduced throughout the game. The more you explore, the more you will learn about what's actually happening, and the better equipped you are to take care of problems later in the game. The plot line is interesting and engaging, though perhaps a bit thin for role playing purists. It's one of the best plotlines I've seen yet in a first person game, though. The transitions between missions are largely worked into actual game play, so the story really seems to flow well, with dialogue interspersed. The only other game I can think of that uses a first person interface and includes such a well integrated plot line is Thief: the Dark Project. But where Thief had definite transitions with monologues and stated mission goals, Deus Ex updated all your goals in real time and the missions flowed one into the other with out giving you the feel of a definite break in game and story line. This made it difficult to determine how many missions you had completed, but also made game play much more impressive. Game play is interspersed with transmissions from various parties over "interlink", a sort of two way A/VS. feed hard wired into your brain, and interactions with various NPCs. These are largely non interactive, but in many cases your actions during the game will effect what people say to you, and how you react to them. This feature of changing interpersonal relations based on your actions and past attitudes was another of the rather unique innovations Deus Ex brought to the First Person genre. This was carried through into the mission obstacles. There were usually two or three ways to solve any one problem, none of them being more or less correct than any one of the others. As a result, I finished this game by taking a completely different path than my coworker (who's only halfway through the game). His way was more efficient in some ways than mine, while I beat him at others. It's all up to you to decide how to bypass a problem.
The graphics were decent, if not outstanding, reminding me more of Halflife more than anything else. The atmosphere of the game was slightly dark and brooding, and the graphics helped to bring out the atmosphere of the game quite well. Some of the architectural elements were fantastic, bringing a different flavor to every location; and there were several. New York is distinct from Hong Kong, which feels different from Paris. They even managed to make the military and terrorist installations feel different, so you didn't feel like you were going down the same tunnel you'd just passed through in the last phase of game play. This was probably one of the more enjoyable features of the game, because you wanted to advance as much to see where you ended up next as to see what was being required of you. They actually made an effort to model speech on the characters, so that when you speak to someone, they don't just stare blankly at you while words flow out of a closed mouth. Little touches like this made it more interesting during the fairly frequent encounters between JC and various NPCs. All conversation and cut scenes where done in the same engine as the game, so they didn't interrupt the flow of gameplay, a feature I liked. The game is powered by the Unreal engine, though they've managed to alter the feel of combat considerably. In Deus Ex combat is generally slow and painful. In some cases literally. The game did not reward the traditional First Person Shooter style of flying feet and blazing guns. Ammunition was fairly scarce (as was health) and sneaking around to get the perfect shot, or place that crucial mine was a much more efficient and effective way to get through the game than running in with weapons out. For one thing, running around metropolitan areas with a gun in your hand tended to rile the local authorities, often resulting in a very dead JC. For another, the game features extensive security systems, and automatic turrets tended to make short work of you. Combat was fairly even, though things were weighted enough on your side that you could usually win in a toe to toe fight. But be aware that you aren't the only good shot, and all that yelling that guard is doing might well bring his buddies running. That said, the AI suffered from a few problems here, guards seemingly forgetting that you were there only a few minutes (or even seconds) after you shot the guy right next to them.
Two advantages that you have in this game which most of your opponents don't are skills and augmentations. During the game you receive skill points which can be distributed at any time during the game. These allow you to specialize in different areas such as swimming, electronics, or various weapons. These skills have a definite effect on game play, and no where is this more evident than when sniping. At Untrained, you very much practice the sway and pray method of sniping. Try to pull the trigger while swaying past the part of the target you want to hit. There are three more levels of skill (Trained, Advanced, and Master), and as you progress you are able to do each skill more and more easily so that when sniping, your aim is right out of UT: Rock steady and Dead on. This applies to the other skill areas as well, and having high enough levels in some of the non combat skills can be very useful for those of you who would rather avoid combat. During the course of the game you will find Augmentation Canisters. Each of these contains two possible augmentations. At the start of the game you have three, infolink (your link with headquarters), a targeting system that identifies friends, enemies, and neutrals, and a flashlight. You can get several more different augmentations ranging from a built in aqualung, to image intensifiers. Choose wisely, though, because most slots can only take one augmentation, and there is usually only one of the two that will prove very useful. You can also upgrade augmentations through four levels, once again with definite advantages during game play. These are of comparatively little use early on in the game, but become progressively more vital as the game progresses.
Most of the actual mechanics of the game are fairly uninteresting. Bypassing one of the numerous keypads in the game involves holding down the mouse button while a timer counts down the strength of the lock. On the plus side, there are other, flashier ways of opening most doors, and explosives often prove useful where you don't have, or can't find the keys. The plus side to this is that you can spend more time playing the game, and less time trying to figure out how to solve irritatingly complex puzzles. It also adds a certain amount of suspense when you are trying to get the door to a storeroom picked before that military robot rounds the corner and turns you into fertilizer. I found this feature of the game much less annoying than most people, since I felt that it added to the suspense in many areas of the game, and was merely routine in others. They keys to almost all of the games vital locks were readily accessible, though, if you were willing to spend the time and energy searching for them. Some of them where ridiculously easy to find, such as passwords left on data cubes next to computers. Which brings me to another AI problem. You could hack someone's computer while standing right in front of them, and no one seemed to mind in the least. Useful, but not very realistic.
The sound track added to the atmosphere of the game, but was not particularly distinguished in and of itself. It was used, almost as a form of ambient noise, to set a mood, and then, when the mood changed, it was just as quickly dismissed. The one exception I found was the theme they played when you died in Paris. It was worth dying just to hear it. The ambient sounds of the game were marvelously well done, adding considerably to the overall feeling of the game. I spent several tense minutes crouched in dark corners wondering where the robot or sentry I was listening to was. The NPCs also had conversations if they didn't know you were there. No mindless soulless killing machines here. Some of the conversations were worth listening to as information sources, others just made you feel more like you were walking through a city rather than running through a computer simulated killing ground.
The game was relatively error free. I only found one area where the walls were transparent (and then, only underwater), and the game only rarely crashed (usually right at startup, and then a reboot set things right), and game play was generally smooth, stuttering only in rare occasions. I'm not sure how well it would run on something other than the P3/500 I was using, though. There were times where the 16MB of video RAM and 128 MB of system RAM seemed barely adequate for the job, but they were few and far between. My biggest complaint was the save games. They're HUGE! Like 20+MB each. They were big enough that Ion included a free space counter on the save and load screens. Now admittedly the game keeps track of every switch you throw (and there are a lot), every pot you move, and every person you talk to, as well as the remaining strength of locks and doors, but I think it's a bit excessive to find that you have over a Gig of save games for one run through. And with the length of this game, that's not an unreasonable assumption either. This is a long game. I went without sleep, and largely neglected my family for over a week to finish this game. At one point I even hopped on the internet just to make sure that it did indeed end. It does, and with three possible endings, it's well worth the struggle to get there. If you are looking for a game that will deliver a lot of very enjoyable time for the money, Deus Ex delivers.
Just got word from the WFA team that Weapons Factory Arena has been released.
WFA v1.0 Announcement Out of the BetaAnd of course we have the files for you available.
There has been a lot of work going on in the realm of maps, art, and code fixes the past few weeks. The preparation is all for the v1.0 release of WFA. This is the first official version and also contains some important differences. For example, if you are playing nurse regularly, there is a new indicator on the hud to tell you what drug powerup you have loaded. As well, we took the feedback from the players and made the alt-fire on the dartgun the delivery method for drug powerups. So no longer will you have to chase after teammates with the gauntlet. The flag disappearance bug and weapon 0 bug have been beaten we think, and its time for v1.0 to be unleashed.
Server Admins:
Unfortunately because of pure server issues, all players and server admins must delete their old WFA directories and install the full version 1.0. You should copy your old class configs and remember to re-edit the wfa-server.cfg and wfa-server.ini.
PoW is modelled directly upon JailBreak for Quake 2. A few of the maps are even derived from Q2JB maps. The idea of PoW (and JB) is team deathmatch with a twist: Instead of just respawning when you die you are sent to "jail" in the enemy team's base. It is up to your teammates to break into the base and set you free, giving PoW CTF-like elements of offense and defense and team bases. If one team totally eliminates the other's players all the jailbirds are fragged and points are awarded to the remaining team.
You'll find this mod particularly fun if you are not into straight DM but don't enjoy guarding or capping a flag all day. The play revolves around the players and team DM tactics rather than a stick with a banner on it. Many of the old SpaceMonster Q2 JB players have gravitated to PoW and I see a lot of familiar names on the server. If you were once a SpaceMonster JailBreakplayer and you miss the Q2 server, go grab this mod now! Much of the same great competition is available to you with the same people from JailBreak.
The update is only really a new map pack which includes a fixed old map as well. PoW now boasts a solid 27 maps! What's mind boggling is that most of them are really neat and very well done. Black Knight Productions (http://www.bkp-mods.com) did a fantastic job on this Quake 3 mod. It's solid, pretty, fun, and a fast-paced blast to play. PoW just needs more players, get on it!
You can pick up the mod at the BKP home page or grab a local copy at ftp://ftp.smgn.com/q3/PoW. After you've done that we hope to see you on SpaceMonster PoW!
This evening, one of the game servers will be down for the night, whirlygig.smgn.com. This is a dual-processor machine that hosts two UT games (CTF and Assault) and a Quake 3 server (Weapons Factory Arena). This shouldn't be an extended outage as the guts of the box are only being transplanted into another case. The present case does not allow proper CPU cooling with the case cover on. Leaving it open has become 'not an option.'
I don't take the boxes down too often so I hope you won't hold it against me =). Everything should return to normal tomorrow barring any hardware/case building problems. Please be patient.
The newest official patch for UT is 425. News and release notes can be found at the official Epic Unreal Technology Page (http://unreal.epicgames.com) and the release notes are available here.
As usual we have a local copy available here for the SpaceMonster faithful =). This mirror has not been publically advertised except on this page so if you're finding nothing but slow, hammered sites when trying to get UT 425 remember who's your daddy... 425 Patch NOW!
The server I brought down yesterday to do the work on is back up, just on a different IP address. The server's primary DNS name is whirlygig.spacemonster.org. The IP (if your DNS hasn't refreshed) is 209.20.148.196, and used to be 207.202.188.174.
The servers that were affected along with their new IP:Port combinations are:
SpaceMonster Assault UT: 209.20.148.196:7777
SpaceMonster CTF UT: 209.20.148.196:8888
SpaceMonster WFA: 209.20.148.196:27960Note also that all of the SpaceMonster UT servers have been upgraded to version 425 which was released by Epic Games today to the general public. All of you that have been bugging me to give you the private test versions can go get it now. =)
The UT Challenge Voting mod is being installed on the UT servers here at SpaceMonster. You can check out more about it at the UTC page. The mod doesn't affect normal play but does offer the ability to vote on changes to the server including map voting, friendly fire damage percentage, fraglimit, and player kicking. The server will automatically download the mod to your UT but if you would like the best experience possible install it using the UMOD installer or the .ZIP file so you can get all the docs read in the process. It's not that hard to figure out but it helps to know the key words.
A local copy is available on the SpaceMonster FTP site right here in either UMOD (Windows) format or in ZIP file format for Linux/Mac. There is also the README file.
The Heavy Metal F.A.K.K.2 game demo has been released by Ritual Entertainment. The demo consists of:
4 different levels
3 different Julie Skins
8 different weapons
5 different monsters
The word from Ritual: "Grab the demo, you won't be sorry."Naturally, a local copy of the demo is available.
/me hopes it's a whole HELL of a lot better than the stinkbomb direct to cable movie...
The latest patch for Unreal Tournament has been released by Epic Games. We have a local copy for download available here.
Version 428 is completely network compatible with all previous public releases of UT (versions 400, 402, 405b, 413, 420, and 425).
Bug fixes
- fixed 425's D3D problems
- improved client prediction of other players on slopes
- fixed 'killall bot' working on servers even if not admin
- fixed Unrealed2 problems with DirectInput (by disabling DirectInput when using Unrealed2).
- fixed picked up weapons occasionally looping firing anim.
- fixed another case where server would keep sending data to client after disconnect.
- fixed Unrealed2 mesh viewer problem.
- fixed Owner being passed to new actor in Mutator.ReplaceWith().
- fixed creeping ping problem with Win2K.
- fix for occasional accidental port changes on servers using NGStats: These ini files are used:
[IpServer.UdpServerQuery] OldQueryPortNumber=0 bRestartServerOnPortSwap=True OldQueryPortNumber will get saved to the current value of the query port number. If the port number changes, the server will quit - and restart automatically if you are using an appropriate batch file ( see http:\\unreal.epicgames.com\utservers.htm ).
Setting OldQueryPortNumber to 0 will cause it to save the current port number again, so you should set this value to 0 when you want to change the port number deliberately (ie you're running a second server on the same machine).Users of S3 Savage 4 chipset and Viper II/Savage2000 cards should try using the latest S3 MeTaL drivers specific to their card to obtain the best performance. New Metal .dlls are available from S3's support site. Note: after applying our latest UT patch, you should only need to put the appropriate Metal.DLL file for your particular S3 card into your UnrealTournament\system folder, while keeping the MetalDrv.dll that comes with the UT patch.
POP!! Splat!
We've got a new hosting, PfefferLand at http://www.pfefferland.com. The Pfeffers are an AntiClan of hardcore gamers who mostly play Half-Life Team Fortress Classic and some other games including CounterStrike. Members of the Pfeffers also run several game servers, a couple of which are hosted here at SpaceMonster. To learn more about the [Pfeffer] way of life check out the Pfefferland website.
Reminder: if you have a non-profit gaming-related website and you would like to have it hosted at SpaceMonster drop us a line at hosting@spacemonster.com.
Unreal Tournament version 432 (RELEASE NOTES) was released to the public. A server update is to follow so for now the SpaceMonster UT servers will be staying at 430 for the next few days. There are several changes and fixes including some to address cheats. There's also one big change which should make people happy (like me) who hate the 30-second wait until the CD check completes on startup.
A local mirror of the new patch is available here at SpaceMonster.
Elite Forces is the new first person shooter from Raven. Like Klingon Honour Guard it takes place in the Star Trek Universe, but unlike KHG, it's taken from the federation's viewpoint. I'm not sure how well a first person shooter fits with Next Generation's emphasis on peacefull resolutions to problems whenever possible, but it is fun. They have invented a "hazard team" which is kind of like a far future version of a modern military special forces unit. It is somewhat telling that they had to invent such a unit, since one does not exist within the federation. The graphics for the characters are decent, certainly along the lines of what you would expect from a modern 3D accelerated game, but where the game really shined was in the backgrounds. They may or may not do anything for you if you aren't into star trek, but if you are a trekker, you will be pleased with the accuracy and beauty of the background. The game is based on the Quake III engine, and sad to say it was my first brush with it. The mechanics were acceptable, and did not hinder gameplay at all. There are two modes of play in Elite Forces, Holosuite, which is like deathmatch, and single player. The holosuite wasn't anything to write home about. Deathmatch in the federation. It was somehow less satisfying to me than Unreal Tournament. It felt kind of like they threw it in because it was easy and expected, rather than making it a fundamental part of the game. Your mileage may vary. Single player was much more fun and well worth the purchase price of the game. It was not without flaw, however. For one thing it's really short. I almost beat the game in one sitting (ok, it was a long sitting). My other big complaint was that it was too linear. You couldn't screw up. If you were heading off in the wrong direction, there WOULD be an immovable barrier. Suppossed to take a right or left? Trust me, if you are suppossed to take a left, the right branch will quickly dead end, though there might be some health or ammo down there. It's also oddly variable in difficulty. I played on normal, and found that there were only a couple spots in the game where I had any kind of challenge at all. Of course those spots were really challenging. Probably the hardest enemy of all is the end boss (as it should be), though they could have been kind enough to give some kind of sign that you were hurting him. Most of the enemies are very satisfactory in this regard. You shoot them two or three times, and they go away (you have to love the alternate fire on the hand phaser, disintegration is your friend). The last boss has no such feed back. He'll eventually go away, but you will have to work at it. I wouldn't call the game balanced (you are usually massively more powerful than the bots), and I couldn't call it complex or long, but I will call it fun. If you have any interest in Star Trek, you'll like this. If you don't watch Star Trek, you may still enjoy it, but you're probably better off getting something else.
Hey everybody, this is my first article. Is this thing on? Just wanted to give my impressions of the three new maps (flagrun, casbah, and avanti) included with the patch from valve (11011104). First of all, I’m frustrated that I’m getting my ass handed to me on the new maps. The reason: SPAM, and lots of it. It seems that when you can’t win by skill (because no one knows the maps yet), take everything down with ya. Second, they are BIG. Most of the maps I have gotten used too, mainly sniper, play pretty tight so that you can generally hear your enemy coming. There are enough open areas in these maps that you never see the opponent, this is good, but frustrating. Lastly, I have really have gotten into sniper and CS lately, and these maps are more scenario and CTF than I generally like. My guess is, that Valve is working on TFC2, and it is largely scenario based with large “team adventures”. How else could you sell a multiplayer game than to add some of that single player “adventure”? I know a lot of people where wondering when we would through in some of the old favorites back on Pfefferzone. Doesn’t matter to me, I would like to learn these maps, but can always go to Pfefferland or Tera Firma for my fix, just "Stop the Spam" please. -Quato
GA Source has an exclusive demo of the new FPS Venom.
This demo includes two single player missions (which can both be played cooperatively), that features an indoor and an outdoor level. It also features an additional outdoor level for a Capture The Flag game.You can grab the demo here.
Weapons Factory Arena 2.1 has been released as a small patch to 2.0. Both of the SpaceMonster WFA servers have been upgraded to the new version. I've been working with input from the people on the WFREF mailing list as well as some clan leaders and the OGL rules to make SpaceMonster 2 WFA more match-play compatible. As a result, SpaceMonster 2 WFA now has all of the OGL maps officially voted in recently available on it for clan matches. If you try to connect to it without the OGL maps it will say it's trying to download them but will fail due to an issue with the download code in Quake 3. Enabling downloads on the server did not work so you'll have to visit WFAMAPS and download the new OGL maps from their OGL MAPS link on the main page. I've made a local copy of the entire pack option available herefor convenience.
The main WFA Public server will continue to run the maps that were released with WFA 2.0/2.1. The match server's name has been revised to "SpaceMonster 2 OGL MAPS WFA v2.1". Please don't try to connect to it unless you've downloaded the OGL maps. Some of the names of the OGL maps overlap different versions of the release maps it appears and there's nothing I can do about this other than lobby the WFA, WFAMAPS, and OGL people to include version numbers with each map name in the future.
Hey All! Let me introduce myself. The nickname is DOH and I have run the Pfeffer servers for the last year with the help of Rhomboid and EnragedTech. In addition to my abnormal life/career I work at GameSpy Arcade as a Admin/Moderator. I will be posting news and information here as I come accross info worthy of the mighty SMGN!Anyway to the point at hand. The new Half Life patch by Valve Software has had a number of problems with many of the Half Life mods (both client and server side). Many servers are having problems with crashes and increased client lag errors. I have managed to keep the servers up and running...but until we get a fix for the current patch we will have to deal with server crashes. From information Valve has released the problem in this patch is caused by some old code that somehow got into this build and is causing problems.
They have been working to get a fix out so please be patient as the patch is fixed.
FRAG ON!
Ok boys and girls I know you have been waiting for it! Thats right UTF is almost done BABY! Check out their website for details UT FortressHere is the announcement from the UTF site:
It's here, after 11 months of blood sweat and tears, team hassles and engine hassles. We are finally happy to release Unreal Fortress.
It is of course a beta release so a lot of models, skins and code will change with future releases.
The release will be on Friday 10th November at midnight GMT (7pm EST). The ftp servers for download will be posted on our web page and announced on our irc channel which you can connect to on either Gamesnet, Quakenet or EnterTheGame. (channel #unrealfortress).
It should be one hell of a party so we hope to see you there.
Epic Games has released Unreal Tournament version 436. With the arrival of 436 there is a break in compatibility with versions before 432 so make sure to upgrade if you want to get the best server support as most of them will upgrade soon. There is no problem with a 436 client connecting to a pre-432 server however so it's better to upgrade ASAP if you want the broadest server selection.
We have a local mirror here for you and I'm sure UT436 is popping up on all the major file repositories as I type this. There is also a "No Delta" version available here which does not require the CD to patch against but is a much bigger size as a result.
The obligatory release note synopsis:
The following files are available:
UTPatch436.exe (7.2 MB - the patch)
UTPatch436NoDelta.exe (33 MB - the patch for people who have CD reading problems when patching, or have the Japanese version of UT, or the 428 version bundled with some Creative Labs products)
UTServer436final (92 MB - the server-only version (does not require a retail copy of UT))
Fixes from 432 include:
- fixed joystick button handling code (thanks Chris Carollo).
- hack fix for bad playerstart in CTF-Coret.
- fixed crash for servers with more than 255 characters worth of server packages.
- fixed problems with single player ladder than cropped up in 432.
- Server now report to clients whether or not they are password protected.
- Fixed incompatibility in ChallengeHUD that caused problem for some mods.
- In the editor, the "TextureLock" option should work 100% now.
- Fixed the editor crash that some people were getting when docking a browser and getting a crash when trying to restart the editor.
- Rewrote "UEditorEngine::polySelectMatchingBrush" because SHIFT+B was crashing at random times in the editor. Should be stable now.
- Brush clipping was merging faces on the resulting brush in the editor.
- May have fixed the random "WinMain/message pump" crash in the editor.
Tonight Counter-Strike released the first non-beta version of CS. Go download it now! Counter-Stikev1.0
-----
[11.9.00]
- added three new weapons:
(H&K UMP .45, FN Five-Seven, & SIG SG-550)
- redone player models
- incorporated Valve's model blending technology
- left beta stages
Counter-Strike 1.0 is out and about. We have local copies available here for your pleasure. Need I say more?
The full 1.0 download (80MB):
ftp://ftp.spacemonster.com/half-life/cstrike/cs10.exe
The 7.1-beta to 1.0 upgrade:
Another big mod release today: Unreal Fortress for UT. UF is a class based mod similar to the Team Fortress family with games such as Capture the Flag. Check out the mod's home page at http://www.unrealfortress.com
Local mirrors:
ftp://ftp.spacemonster.com/epicgames/unreal_tournament/UnrealFortressPR1-non-umod.zip
ftp://ftp.spacemonster.com/epicgames/unreal_tournament/UnrealFortressPR1.zip
This is the second patch actually, here is what the new patch covers. Download the patch and give it a try! =)
*UnF 199 is here!
*Build 199 of UnF is here, with mirrors listed on our Downloads page. In addition to Cyber Emperor's new map, UnF-UserFriendly, fixes and features include:
*Gameplay
*Ammo handling tidied up
*Metal for armourer is now an ammotype
*New KeyBinds system written
*Grenade Spam Fix
*Can no longer set yourself alight
*Can no longer infect yourself
*Various Access None fixes
*Team Size added to HUD Team Score
*Spy disguise HUD info fixed (we think)
*HUD Team symbols force to transparency
*New parameter for DisguiseAsTeam (auto selects enemy team)
*Weapons
*Sniper rifle firing/zoom mechanism altered
*Melee weapons range increased
*Minigun power and accuracy tweaked
*Grenades
*Tripmine Alignment fix
*Frag grenade scaled up
*Emp grenades now disable mortars
*Equipment
*Sentry completely re-written (remove gun feature not yet working and hence has been disabled)
*Scaling of sentry fire fixed
*Scanner fixed
*Sentry and Dispenser can now be dismantled
This is the second patch actually, here is what the new patch covers. Download the patch and give it a try! =)
UnF 199 is here!
Build 199 of UnF is here, with mirrors listed on our Downloads page. In addition to Cyber Emperor's new map, UnF-UserFriendly, fixes and features include:Gameplay
-Ammo handling tidied up
-Metal for armourer is now an ammotype
-New KeyBinds system written
-Grenade Spam Fix
-Can no longer set yourself alight
-Can no longer infect yourself
-Various Access None fixes
-Team Size added to HUD Team Score
-Spy disguise HUD info fixed (we think)
-HUD Team symbols force to transparency
-New parameter for DisguiseAsTeam (auto selects enemy team)Weapons
-Sniper rifle firing/zoom mechanism altered
-Melee weapons range increased
-Minigun power and accuracy tweakedGrenades
-Tripmine Alignment fix
-Frag grenade scaled up
-Emp grenades now disable mortarsEquipment
-Sentry completely re-written (remove gun feature not yet working and hence has been disabled)
-Scaling of sentry fire fixed
-Scanner fixed
-Sentry and Dispenser can now be dismantled
Just in time for the long weekend (for some of us anyway) comes the Quake 3 Team Arena Demo. This is a self-contained demo meaning that you don't need Quake 3 Arena to install and play. If you do have Quake 3 it is recommended that you do NOT install it into the same location as your present Q3 installation.
Here is a link to the local mirror here at SpaceMonster:
ftp://ftp.spacemonster.com/q3/TeamArenaDemo.exe
Currently the demo is only available for Windows, Linux and Mac versions are due out soon.
Some README action for your glossies:
An MPEG of Q3TA gameplay has been released showing off some of the other maps and content that didn't come in the recently released Team Arena demo. We have a local copy of the movie available here:
ftp://ftp.smgn.com/movies/q3ta_trailer.mpg
Todd Hollenshead of id Software made a .plan file update to accompany the release and shed a little light on the contents of the flick:
Name: Todd Hollenshead
Email: toddh@idsoftware.com
Description: CEO
Project:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
11/30/2000
Big news once again:
Just in time for the weekend, we are releasing a new Quake III: Team Arena movie. At just over 2 minutes, this movie packs in a ton of never before seen features from Team Arena. If you've played the demo, this is a different clip than what plays in the main menu, so you'll definitely want to check this out, too.
IGN.com is once again going to be handling the initial bandwidth for the download. The download weighs in at around 20MB, so for those of you who were afraid the demo download would melt your modem, this makes it easy for you to check out some of the incredible new stuff that is in Team Arena.
Even if you have played the demo 18 hours a day, for the last 9 days, only taking breaks for bathing, food, and familial Thanksgiving responsibilities, you should still check this out as it contains scenes from our new large scale, terrain based maps. That's right, included in Team Arena are a number of never-seen-anywhere- before-now huge maps. These maps include castles, watchtowers, rivers, bunkers, forts, mountains and just about anything else you could want in battlegrounds of this magnitude.
Enough said - go download the movie. Believe me, it's cool.
Sunday, 24 December, 2000 19:15:09 PST
UT Bonus Pack 4The fourth FREE add-on pack for Unreal Tournament by Epic Games is out. The bonus pack includes several goodies:
- 2 new hi-res player characters with skins,
- 10 new maps spanning all 4 UT modes - Capture the Flag, Deathmatch, Domination and Team Deathmatch,
- 2 updated UT maps - a remixed version of the original Lament map and a slightly modified version of the infamous Facing Worlds map.Neat little Holiday offering, eh? Especially when certain other FPS developers are making you pay for improvements to their products... not mentioning any identifying names. 8)
Local copies in both UMOD and non-UMOD format are available:
UT Bonus Pack 4 UMOD format
UT Bonus Pack 4 non-UMOD format
Tuesday, 27 February, 2001 10:13:59 PST
Hello GentlemenAll your Space are belong to us.
Wednesday, 14 March, 2001 17:41:12 PST
Local Half-Life and Counterstrike Update MirrorsWe now have local copies of the Half-Life 1.1.0.6 and Counter-Strike 1.1 releases in various forms. There are incremental updates to the previous public versions and "full" updates that should update any previous version to the new.
The files are available from the SpaceMonster FTP site here:
ftp://ftp.spacemonster.com/half-life/valve
So cancel that slow-ass Fileplanet download and step up.
Sunday, 25 March, 2001 22:26:18 PST
Serious Sam Server StartedSpaceMonster now has a Serious Sam Co-Op server up and running for your alien butt-kicking pleasure.
If you enjoyed Doom, Doom 2, and Duke Nukem and felt like something was missing from Quake and other First Person Action games, like the enemies, you owe it to yourself to pick up Serious Sam ASAP. There's almost no creeping through dark, abandoned bases or claustrophobic alien strongholds here. Serious Sam is Big, Loud, Colorful, and Kicks Ass, a LOT of Asses for that matter. Some of the maps have more than one thousand enemies and it's not unusual for huge numbers of them to be attacking you all at once. The graphics are great and the mammoth maps are massive sights to behold. I wouldn't be surprised if you could fit all the maps in Quake into a single Serious Sam map.
Serious Sam was designed from the ground up to support Cooperative Multiplayer. It wasn't added as an afterthought or patch, it's a core game type and it's an absolute blast. Get this game!.
Wednesday, 06 June, 2001 11:11:21 PST
D-DayToday is D-Day. As you play online wargames, dying and respawning take a moment and remember the thousands that died on a cold gray beach soaked in blood and gave their lives for freedom. This is one of those days that changed the world, take a moment and remember... always.