Wednesday, August 22, 2007

Leipzig

There's news from the Leipzig Games Convention this week, and three announcements in particular are high on my list.

First, the sequel to Mafia (one of my all-time favorite PC game) is being published by 2K Games. It's also being developed by Illusion Softworks, who did such a tremendous job on the original (although I don't know how much of the original team is left).

If you've never played Mafia, it was one of the most atmospheric, gripping PC games I've ever played, with superb writing and cinematic moments that were leaps and bounds beyond what anyone else was doing in 2002. Some of the finest moments I've ever had in gaming happened while I was playing Mafia, so an official announcement of both the game and the publisher is great news.

If you'd like to see a few screenshots, go here.

Then there's Rock Band, which announced a few new tracks today.

No big deal, really--just a song that was part of the #1 album on my wish list. We don't get Combat Rock (yet), but we do get Should I Stay Or Should I Go.

We also get Gimme Shelter (Rolling Stones), Highway Star (Deep Purple), Cherub Rock (Smashing Pumpkins), Creep (Radiohead), Are You Gonna Be My Girl (Jett, and it's a terrific song), Here It Goes Again (OK Go), The Hand That Feeds (Nine Inch Nails), Epic (Faith No More), and Sabotage (Beastie Boys).

I think the song lists for both Rock Band and Guitar Hero III are unbelievably strong. Thank you for competition.

I also saw over at the Qt3 forums today that Empire: Total War has been announced, and here's an excerpt from the press release:
SEGA Europe Ltd. and SEGA of America, Inc. today announced Empire: Total War, the revolutionary new instalment of The Creative Assembly’s wildly successful, multi award winning Total War RTS franchise. Empire: Total War will maintain the series genre leading 3D battles, grand turn based campaign map and rich historical flavour while for the first time introducing 3D naval combat into the series.

That's right. Naval combat.

Empire: Total War will see the debut of 3D naval combat within the Total War franchise. PC Gamers will be able to intuitively command vast fleets or single ships upon seascapes rich with extraordinary water and weather effects that play a huge role in your eventual glorious success or ignominious defeat. After pummelling your enemy with cannon fire, close in to grapple their ship and prepare to board taking control your men as they fight hand to hand on the decks.

And if that isn't enough to make you salivate, take a look at some screenshots here (thanks Voodoo Extreme).

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