Just found this over at GamesRadar.com, free 3rd-person MMO title coming out March 2009.

The graphics are awesome for a free MMO, probably because it uses the Unreal Engine 3, fingers crossed the gameplay is fun too, i’m just imagining GTA-style gameplay in an MMO setting and for FREE, anyone else salivating yet?

Seriously though, this is the way of the future, totally immersive VR type environments, iPod Touch ain’t got nothin’ on CAVE

Now to convice the bank to give me a $20,000 loan to get my very own CAVE setup

For you guys that check this site for updates (Yep, i see all 2 of you putting your hands up), i’ve been MIA for the last week, i got around to installing a bunch of games i’ve either bought or been given (my brother gave me ET:Quake Wars Collectors Edition for XMAS, :D), including Bioshock, so i’ve been a bit of a hermit and just playing a lot of games.

My ADSL also died so that was probably the main reason, but it gave me a good excuse to actually get around to all those games, i’m not even playing World of Warcraft much either, it really sucks up all my free time and i can’t experience any other games. ADSL is back so i should be updating more often again, ok, back to Bioshock, i need to save some more Little Sisters, i don’t know why but i can’t seem to make myself kill little girls even if they look like a mini-Exorcist girl AND i normally pick the “bad” path in games, like any Star Wars games i’ll do the evil “Dark Side” shit >:D

Oh yeah, and my POS fossil rig is actually doing OK, running Bioshock at 1440×900, most details on High, DX9, and its definately playable, it goes to show you can still make a great game with fairly nice graphics, great gameplay/design AND not need Quad-SLI 9800GX2’s to play it, *ahem* Crysis. For the curious, my rig’s an A64 3000+, 1GB DDR, 7900GS 512MB, i don’t think i’ll be upgrading for now caus the cheapskate in me is satisfied and i don’t really care about Crysis, i’ve heard its all eye candy and not that great of a game. Fingers crossed more developers focus on great game design and playabiliy over “OMG Eye Candy s3x!” for upcoming games.

Steam have announced that Assassin’s Creed and a slew of other Ubisoft titles, are being released on Steam.

Assassin’s Creed is available for pre-order on Steam now. Can it get any better than this? Direct downloads are the way of the future, i eagerly await the day when we’ll be able to buy ALL OUR GAMES from Steam, less time traveling to the games shop and more time playing!

Found this “review” at TechArp.com , maybe this review title should be called “A Love Poem to my Dear 9600GT”, me thinks the author could have a 9600GT fetish.

It really gets under my skin when reviewers skew a product in a better light by omitting small details here and there. Don’t get me wrong here, i agree the 9600GT is a great budget card, but this reviewer can really talk up a product by glossing over weaker points and emphasizing stronger ones, here are some examples:

Company of Heroes page

Even at 1600 x 1200, it was slightly (3%) slower than the GeForce 8800 GT running at 1920 x 1200.

Ok fair enough, maybe he’s trying to show that the 9600GT can still keep up… at lower resolutions. Well thank you Mr Obvious. What he glosses over is the direct comparison between resolutions, where the 8800GT has around 25% - 33% advantage over the 9600GT, and the 8800GTS 512 has from 30% - 45% advantage.

Scroll down to the DX10 Company of Heroes section, where he states:

At 1280 x 1024, the NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT was slightly faster than the GeForce 8800 GT running at 1600 x 1200.

OH MY GOD, stop bloody comparing apples to oranges, by his logic thats like some drunken bum off the street bragging about beating Mike Tyson in a fight as long as Tyson is blindfolded, with both hands tied behind his back.

If you actually look at the figures, the 8800GT is, again, around 25% faster than the 9600GT, oh he glossed over that little tidbit of info as well, whoops! Did you notice how confusing the graphs are in this review? Normally you would have the resolutions grouped together so its easier to visualise how the cards compare to each other on the same resolution, but the way it’s laid out in this review, trying to figure it out is worse than calculating my Tax without an accountant or a calculator.

The thing is the 9600GT is definately not a bad card, it’s good and can tag behind the 8800GT and GTS, but this is at lower fidelity, i.e 1280×1024 and lower , 0xAF , 0xAA, but the 8800GT and GTS pull away as the resolutions get higher. Here’s my take on it, if you are on an ultra budget and your name is “Scrooge”, get a 9600GT if your native resolution is 1280×1024 or less, on the other hand if you run 1440×900 or higher and you want some AA and AF get the 8800GT. Otherwise there is a minimal price difference between the 9600GT and 8800GT, check here, you can find a 8800GT at ~$190, whereas 9600GT’s range from $160-$180.

The price difference is minimal, yet at higher quality/resolutions you’ll be getting anywhere from 20-35% faster performance from the 8800GT.

I think i’ll leave it at that, i’m sure you’ll find more examples of what i’m talking about if you check out the rest of the article, i would find and type up more examples to rant about, of which there are plenty, but then my head would implode.

End Rant

As you all know, AMD recently released a new B3 stepping of their Phenom series. The original Phenom’s were plagued with issues that lead to them not being the optimum upgrade path for gamers/enthusiasts at the time.

The new Phenom’s have addressed these issues and they look to provide a good upgrade alternative to the Quad Core (and even the Dual Core Wolfdales which are in scarce supply at the moment) Intel offerings.

This is especially true for owners of existing AM2 and AM2+ setups, with the highest of the new releases, the X4 9850 ‘Black Edition” ( 2.5Ghz, 2MB L2 cache, 2MB L3 cache, unlocked multiplier, 4000Mhz HyperTransport Bus ) with an estimated release price of $235 USD.

The unlocked multiplier should be very appealing to enthusiasts/overclockers, this review over at TechReport.com shows an easily attainable, stable 2.9Ghz overclock.

Check out the TechReport review for the full benchmark details, but here’s an interesting line from the article:

The Phenom X4 9850 Black Edition can’t always keep pace with the Core 2 Quad Q6600 or the Core 2 Duo E8500, but it’s close.

This is something to think about for anyone wanting to upgrade at the moment, the E8500 is around ~$300 USD (if you can find it, and due to demand the price may rise), but both the 65nm Kentsfield Q6600, and the 45nm Wolfdale E8400 are around ~230-250 USD, which places it in direct competition with the new X4 9850 “Black Edition” Phenom.

It’s a tough choice, but in my opinion, if you have an AM2/AM2+ setup and wanting to upgrade i would go with the new X4 Phenom line (especially the X4 9850 ‘Black Edition’ due to the unlocked multiplier - allowing for very easy overclocking). If you already have a previous generation Intel setup (with a P35 or G33 type board, check here for a listing of Wolfdale & Yorkfield compatible motherboards) then go with an E8400 if you can find it. Both upgrades only require a CPU replacement and will keep your system in the gaming stakes.

Whatever choice you make, it’s good news for all, with AMD providing a viable and competitive alternative.

Wow, Prey is on special for $4.95 USD on Steam for this weekend only. Pick it up if you wanted to buy it in the past but the cheap bastard in you said no. I <3 Steam.

On a lesser note, that could interest some or bore to death others (count me in the former camp), Eric Twelker who posted the news article, is really Marty McFly, because he seems to have pulled out the De Lorean and jumped into the future to post this article on March 31st 10:05am, or maybe not and it was just a typo and i’m really freaking bored, anyway whatever.. De Lorean’s are cool.

Steam powered De Lorean!

Call of Duty 4 is getting four new maps, but only on Xbox 360 and PS3 versions.

They all look sweet, and damn that creek map looks nice, camouflage/sniper heaven, they better release these for PC as well, where’s the PC love Infinity Ward?

Earlier this month, we heard of Intel’s plans to release a new contender for the entry-level desktop crown.

Now Overclock3D.Net have some new info that suggest the Atom 230 part will be even cheaper than the original $29 first predicted.

Keep an eye out for the Atom 3XX series, rumoured to be Dual Core with either 512K or 1MB of L2 Cache running at 533Mhz FSB. This could be a viable option for the ultra-low-budget gamer, just whack a 8600GT with it and away you go, albeit you probably wouldn’t run Crysis (most of us can’t anyway), but you could definately play some older titles and heck even some newer ones too.

Comparing specs alone, the Sempron is going to be K.O’ed for this match up.

I dunno maybe i’ve been won over by Mark’s marketing power.. regardless, we as PC Gamers should pray that this new initiative makes some progress, otherwise we’ll all end up trying to play FPS’s and RTS’s using an X-Brick 360 controller or even worse some Nunchucks…

Bruce getting frustrated at Mario..

Unreal creator Tim Sweeny highlights a pretty good point:

Intel’s integrated graphics just don’t work. I don’t think they will ever work.

Amen to that Mr Sweeny, i feel what you’re saying, you’d think a Core 2 Duo 2.4Ghz + 1GB DDR spec laptop would run Vietcong 2 (specs) right? WRONG, one word - Intel Integrated Graphics (O.K three words..)… but hey, atleast i can still play World of Warcraft on my laptop, no seriously i can.

Don’t get me wrong, i don’t mind consoles heck i even enjoyed, no.. loved Goldeneye on the N64 (and it’s an FPS no less!), but give me the flexibility, tweak-ability, and power of my Gaming PC anyday.