Daily News Spin — March 1, 2001 (Thursday)

Before there was "All your base..."

...there was fucking big mouse, though this was mainly confined to the strategic group on Usenet. Here is Sokwoo Lee's post, "YOU'RE ALL FUCKIN BIG MOUSE", which debuted in September of 1999:

I have subscribed this newsgroup for a month. I thought you people are discussing all kind of strategy games. Since i am also crazy about turn-based all real-time strategy games, I had great expectation on this group. But you all f_cking people have only big mouse. Many people follow the someone's notes (totally not related to strategy games), and those f_cking messages gave me f_cking headache. I know you all have freedom to speak or write, but you people are doing too much. Since old man says "NOBody scares shit to avoid, but they avoid because its f_cking dirty. I will stop subscribing this fucking newsgroup. If you have any other words, fuck you.

Civilization III update

Firaxis has posted some new information about Civilization III on the official site. This update is about the new diplomacy system that will be implemented in the game:

Thus, while we have kept the conversational interface for new users, we have also created a "bargaining table" for advanced users. This new feature can be used to conduct detailed negotiations, during which everything is available for trade, including treaties, gold, goods, technologies, cities, units, world maps, communication with other civilizations, etc. In other words, users will be able to mix-and-match deals without any restrictions. Want to trade your World Map and Bronze Working for a Spearman and Communications with the Indians? No problem. Want to offer a Peace Treaty to the Iroquois, but only if they will pay 5 gold per turn? Just make the demand.

Furthermore, diplomatic relations have been deepened to include a number of new diplomatic agreements that can be added on top of a standard peace treaty. For example, your relations with the Zulus might include a peace treaty as well as a mutual protection pact, a right of passage agreement, and a trade embargo against the French.

The update also includes a few new images and a new round of answers on the Ask the Civ Team page.

Movie tidbits

Dark Horizons is reporting that that movie version of Resident Evil will have Eric Mabius as the male lead opposite Milla Jovovich. Dark Horizons is also reporting that Christopher Lee will star in the next Star Wars movie as the evil Count Dooku.

MMORPGs successful web entertainment ventures

Inside.com has an article looking at the massively multiplayer roleplaying games, examing why they're one of the few web entertainment successes (that is, they make money).

As industry pundits are fond of pointing out, no one has yet found the Web's I Love Lucy -- a killer concept that ends up shaping a new medium. Games like Ultima Online are certainly innovative, but few outside the hard-core gamer world have heard of it. I Love Lucy was the first show to draw an audience of 10 million; the top three MMORPGs so far have a total of only 700,000 to 800,000 subscribers combined....

That may be no I Love Lucy -- it's not even The Jamie Foxx Show -- but TV viewers don't make a conscious decision to pay for individual shows. And perhaps these games aren't as far away from TV-level acceptance as the numbers suggest. After all, last summer's surprise ratings champ, Survivor, was more like Asheron's Call than a TV series. With an exotic locale, largely improvised interaction between players and weekly quests, the show was, at heart, an elaborate, deeply immersive role-playing game.

The article provides an interesting overview of these games, including one of the problems they face, which is how to make more of them and continue to make money since players can really only play one of these at a time.

Another rumor

Fuckedcompany has a new thread claiming that "humongous.com" is going under. Of course we don't know if it's true, and we also don't know if this means the software company that makes the Freddie the Fish games is also in trouble. Humongous was the company that Cavedog was a part of until they closed that division.

Ah, the bitter irony

From Red Herring:

Looking Glass Networks secured $275 million in funding on Tuesday.

No, this Looking Glass has nothing to do with games. It's a private local exchange carrier. Can you imagine the games that Looking Glass Studios could have made with that kind of bankroll? Dang.

Baldur's Gate II expands

Voodoo Extreme has a short blurb claiming knowledge of a BG2 expansion.

This in-the-works expansion pack, entitled Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal, is scheduled for release this Summer. Some of the details include the raising of the experience cap (so that players can reach level 40), new spells and abilities, as well as the addition of a new character class.

Man, level 40 in D&D is waaaay up there. We seem to recall that in the first Baldur's game Elminster, the fabled NPC wizard, was only in the mid-twenties in level.

Update: It's official. Here's a blurb from the press release posted on Yahoo:

Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal takes players through an all-new storyline rich with intrigue and treachery as they unravel the mysteries of the Dungeon of Watcher's Keep and explore other new areas such as the City of Saradush, the Fortified Monastery of Amkethran, Sendai's Underdark Fortress and the player's own Abyssal Stronghold. Throughout their journey, characters may reach up to level 40, made possible with a raised experience cap of 8 million points, quite possibly the highest level ever achieved by characters in any Advanced Dungeons & Dragons computer game. Also included in the quest are over 40 new powerful high-level spells and abilities. The Wild Mage Character Kit will also be included to the already extensive class list allowing gamers to create a powerful new character able to cast spells with very unpredictable results.

EA.com hops on Pogo

Pogo.com has been acquired by EA.com, a subsidary of Electronic Arts, according to this Yahoo story. Pogo is the casual gaming network that used to be the hardcore gaming network TEN. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Pogo, which offers free games, has 17 million registered users. EA.com is hoping that they will have a successful pay-to-play network, with games like Ultima Online, Majestic, and others. We guess that the hope here is that the free network will feed a steady supply of potential customers to the fee-based network.

3am

We missed the story about eUniverse cutting off affliates. According to The Register, eUniverse sent out letters to affliate sites telling them that after March 15th they were on their own. EUniverse owns the Gamer's Alliance network and Case's Ladder, but affliates include a number of gaming fan sites. EUniverse blamed (what else?) the failing advertising model:

It's not that eUniverse is faltering, it's just that banner advertising is no longer a viable option for anyone in this economy.

There's a bit of good news, though. EB is buying Barrysworld, a network of gaming sites in Europe that was going to close down. This may be a more workable business model. The sites will funnel business to EB and the Barrysworld network won't have to be profitable just through advertising.

Finally, a funny article at the Washington Post about the "Nigerian Scam". Spotted first at Lum the Mad's.

Click here to read yesterday's news