Insomniac carved out its fourth "C" behind closed doors at E3 this week: Community. (Can you name the other three?) Bungie has put the pressure on other FPS developers to serve their dedicated player base, and Insomniac hopes to respond by relaunching myresistance.net alongside Resistance 2 this fall.
We were shown some concept slides of the new site design, beginning with a landing page with links to three distinct experiences. To the left was an entryway into the community pages, in the center was "game info," and to the right was "chronicles" (a section of the site that ties the franchise together with content like a timeline system). The landing page will be customizable to some extent. We saw a mock "ticker," which could run along the top of the page displaying various Resistance related feeds (news, developer updates, friends activity, etc.). But what happens when we jump into the community portal?
Insomniac's Ratchet and Clank: Quest for Booty is the first (and possibly only) episodic DLC for the series. Community Relations Manager James Stevenson told us during a hands-on session that RC:QB is an "experiment" and that it could serve as either the start of an episodic series or just a transition between two disc-based titles.
The 3 to 4 hour game is built on the Tools of Destruction engine with some better lighting. Other than a new grapple feature, which is used for puzzle solving and world interaction, the game is in many ways an extension of the Ratchet and Clank series. Stevenson said the game was planned to be "more heavily focused" on platforming elements instead of the guns (although those are available as the game progresses).
We've got three videos from Resistance 2 to ensure your eyes remain firmly glued to the screen. The first, embedded above, is the official E3 2008 trailer. Not much to see except a nanosecond tease for viral site Project Abraham. The other two videos don't have viral teases, but they do show a freaking sweet boss fight with a leviathan, and a brief and quiet snippet of multiplayer. We've embedded those after the break.
Many moons ago we heard of Ratchet: Quest for Booty due to a leaked PSN list, and now the ESRB has rated a very similarly named title. Although Sony hasn't officially acknowledged the game's existence, Ratchet & Clank Future: Quest for Booty is pretty much an open secret now following the software ratings board's listing.
The ESRB rating doesn't explain whether this a retail follow-up to Tools of Destruction or a standalone PSN Ratchet & Clank game. With E3 next week we're not even going to try and pull speculative answers out of Clank's metal heinie; a little bit of patience should result in answers shortly.
While GamePro is sharing the goods on Resistance 2 in its latest issue, we know that not everyone is a fan of getting their game news off the rack so we thought we'd share the first couple of screens from the magazine's cover story. Posted by the PlayStation Blog, the shots give us a look at Chimera-occupied Chicago as well as the city's resident boss, a massive 300-foot Leviathan. Honestly, we don't know if we're more excited to collect the Trophy for dropping this baddie, or simply watch him rip through downtown, Cloverfield-style.
After it was announced that Uncharted and, well, "every game" for the PS3 will receive Trophies, many expected Insomniac's two titles would be on the shortlist of receiving updates in the "foreseeable future." Sadly, Insomniac's Bryan Intihar expresses on the PlayStation Blog that Ratchet and Clank Future and Resistance: Fall of Man aren't getting Trophy updates soon.
Intihar writes that there are currently no plans to add Trophies because the company's "No. 1 focus" is finishing up Resistance 2. We're disappointed, but we'll take this to mean Insomniac isn't dismissive of Trophies and giving it over to the summer intern as busy work.
Let's not mince words, Insomniac's Resistance 2 is sure to be one of Sony's heaviest hitters during E3 later this month. But if you can't wait for what is sure to be minutes devoted to the Trophy-enabled shooter during Sony's pre-show festivities, you might want to take a peek at what GamePro has in store for its latest issue, which features a fold-out cover of the above art, with war-themed propaganda on the back. Nice!
Among the details promised, the mag will offer a look at the game's campaign, co-op, and competitive multiplayer modes, as well as a gaze skyward at a towering 300-foot tall Chimera that besets Chicago as the game's first end-level nasty. For more, we suggest heading to your favorite magazine rack to pick up the latest issue of GamePro, and let your eyeballs soak up the August issue's 10-page cover story on the upcoming FPS.
PS3 Fanboy brings word that a new slice of Resistance 2 footage has popped up on YouTube after appearing on (then disappearing from) Eurogamer TV. If you want a fresh look at Sony's big FPS for the fall, watch it while it's hot. There's a good chance this instance of the video will get pulled soon as well.
Update: We have removed the embedded YouTube player as a courtesy to Sony. (It's still up on YouTube though!)
No longer ensconced in a GameTrailersTV shell, we've assembled Friday night's three gameplay clips from Resistance 2 for you to enjoy without leaving the 'Stiq. Get a first look at one of the game's new locations: Chicago; check out the 60-player multiplayer mode, Skirmish (we've played it, it actually works!); admire the HD graphics (really, watch the HD feeds if you're able) and get a peek at ... holy crap, is that a skyscraper-stomping Godzilla? Multiplayer video is embedded above, and the single-player videos are after the break.
Don't get your hopes up -- the above video isn't particularly fresh or tantalizing, though watching Geoff Keighley get repeatedly shot down by Ted Price, president of Insomniac Games, is rather entertaining. If you're looking for new gameplay videos and information on the sequel to the PS3's well-received launch title, you'll have to watch the entirety of last night's episode of GameTrailers TV, as the individual nuggets of new information about the game have yet to be compartmentalized into easily digestible clips.
There's some interesting gameplay footage spliced throughout the episode, but for those of you who don't have 22 minutes to kill, you can check out chapters oneand two for details about the single player campaign, chapter three for new info about mutliplayer, and chapter four for new characters and weapons. We imagine there's enough footage of Keighley getting the silent treatment from Price to fill up at least seventeen additional chapters.
Insomniac's push eastward was one of last week's most intriguing items of interest, despite a lack of details concerning what exactly the Ratchet & Clank developer has in store for its new Raleigh, NC studio. However, while we don't know exactly what the Burbank, California-based developer has up its sleeves, we figured if anyone had the scoop it would be current Insomniac art director Chad Dezern and gameplay guru Shaun McCabe, both of whom will be given reigns over the company's eastern arm once it opens in January.
We recently spoke with both execs about the new studio, and we couldn't help but kick off the interview by asking the one nagging question on our mind: Why North Carolina?
"We wanted to expand Insomniac's capabilities while retaining the small team culture in Burbank. Opening up an office in The Triangle lets us do that while also offering an alternative for talented people who want to stay on the East Coast," Dezern answered. "Plus, Shaun and I are from the South and we missed the distant strumming of the banjo."
Raleigh, NC had better stock up on Ambien. GameDaily reports that Burbank, CA based Insomniac Games – creator of Resistance and Ratchet & Clank – plans to have a North Carolina office open for business by January 2009. Insomniac art director Chad Dezern will head the studio, with gameplay lead Shaun McCabe taking on the role of production director. Both Insomniac veterans will head east once development wraps on Resistance 2.
The studio, situated in the same "Research Triangle" area of Raleigh-Durham as Gears of War developer Epic Games (no peeking, guys!) will be home to roughly 30 new Insomniacs working on current and all-new franchises for PS3. In his interview with GameDaily, Insomniac president Ted Price points out that a team of 30 should be just the right size for creating a big-time PS3 title using the company's refined tools and technology. PS3 fans should be (rightfully) excited by the prospect of Insomniac likely bringing another all-new franchise to the system by way of the new studio, as the Burbank home base continues to develop future Ratchet and Resistance installments.
In the midst of promoting returning favorites like Resident Evil, Bionic Commando and Street Fighter, Capcom also took a little time for some new properties during last week's Captivate 08 event in Las Vegas. Perhaps the biggest unveiled was Spyborgs, a Wii-exclusive title coming in 2009.
The action title is being created by Bionic Games, an offshoot of sorts of High Impact Games that's chock-full of former Insomniac staffers, and helmed by Mike Stout, Lead Multiplayer Designer for Resistance: Fall of Man. It's early days yet, but what we've seen looks like a sci-fi brawler crossed with an episode of Ren and Stimpy. If that makes zero sense to you (and why should it?), you may just want to come back for our impressions later today.
Sony has two major FPS offerings on tap for releases in the next nine-odd months, both of which have plenty of similarities – not the least of which are their sci-fi trimmings. But how do they differ from one another ... or stack up against other big titles in the genre? Enter MTV's Multiplayer, who have put together a nice comparative feature on the two games, covering points such as visuals, gameplay, and overall themes. Oh, and the abundance of earth tones, of course.
Is there room on PS3 for two similar first-party titles? We say "yes," and "please make sure they're better than Haze." Read on for Multiplayer's observations, along with some developer insight on Sony's positioning of both first-person battles against creepy creatures and ... Space Nazis.
Update: Videos for Resistance 2 and Killzone 2 have been removed at Sony's request. "This was an internal video to show work in progress and was not ready for distribution." We will post new media when it is available.
If you were furiously pounding F5 to follow along with PS3 Fanboy's live coverage of PlayStation Day 2008, you probably felt a little pang of sadness as our man, Jem Alexander, got to see some new footage from Mirror's Edge, Resistance 2 and Killzone 2 while you had to make do with reading his text second-hand.
Now, you can make amends and see the videos directly from the show for yourself. Oh, and you should know that the audio on the Killzone clip seems to become a little crazy at the end, but we're hoping you still get the idea. You can find ResistanceMirror's Edge after the break right here.
