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Left 4 Dead 2 gets bots and SDK fixes in update, 360 patch coming soon

by Griffin McElroy { Feb 6th 2010 at 1:30AM }

Valve has followed through with its promise to bring bots to Left 4 Dead 2's Versus mode -- which was frantic enough before all the A.I.-controlled ghouls got added in. A recent patch added the functionality and made a few tweaks to the software development kit, which allows players to make awesome levels based on awesome Nintendo 64 games. Check out the full list of changes after the jump.

The Steam blog post announcing the patch's release promises that the changes will be integrated into the 360 version of the game via an upcoming title update.

Continued →

Fable 3 'almost at its final edit' stage, says Molyneux

by Ben Gilbert { Feb 5th 2010 at 5:30PM }

The head of MGS Europe assuredly has a few more things on his plate than the third game in a franchise he helped create, but in a recent feature on Peter Molyneux at Develop, the British creator calmly pronounced the game to be nearing its "final edit" stage of production. Whether he means "ready for submission to Microsoft" or "we haven't started polishing it yet" (or, heck, anywhere in between) remains unclear, though we'd certainly like to get our hands on the final product sooner rather than later.

Additionally, Molyneux triple dips on his love for Valve, proclaiming Half-Life 2 as his "favourite" game ever (you crazy Brits!) as well as the game he would most like to have worked on, and also notes the developer as the one he most admires (get a room, you two!). And hey, if you've been hankering to know his "favourite" album, it's Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon." (Yep, we were kind of disappointed too.)

Steam: Pre-order Metro 2033, get Red Faction Guerrilla free

by Alexander Sliwinski { Feb 5th 2010 at 12:55PM }

With a Steam pre-purchase of THQ's upcoming Metro 2033 (which releases March 16) for $50, deal-seekers will also nab Red Faction Guerrilla for free. The Red Planet Revolution sim is regularly priced at $20 -- but, you know, the right Steam sale comes along and that price drops like a Martian communications tower.

Our recent hands-on with Metro 2033 gave us a "good" vibe, but we definitely need more time with the game to see if the feeling lasts. Red Faction Guerrilla, however, made it onto five Joystiq editors' "Best of the Rest" of 2009 lists, and it's totally worth picking up -- even if you have to pay for it.

[Via 1UP]

Team Fortress 2 update adds Highlander mode

by Griffin McElroy { Feb 4th 2010 at 4:30PM }

It's indicative of Valve's creativity that we don't play Team Fortress 2, but we still get excited about the game's hilarious updates. In its most recent patch, TF2 received the new "Highlander" mode, in which teams are composed of nine players -- but each team can only have one of each class. In other words, "There can be only one (Spy, Sniper, Heavy, etc.)." This not only sounds like an interesting new mode, but it also gives us occasion to link to the intro for the Highlander television series, which scientists recently concluded is the coolest intro sequence in the history of mankind.

We're also guessing the ultra-Scottish Demoman class gets some sort of intangible benefits while playing in this mode, but that's just pure speculation.

Multiplayer patched into original Aliens vs. Predator on Steam

by Griffin McElroy { Jan 30th 2010 at 8:30PM }

What fun is Aliens vs. Predator without the knowledge that the Predator whose face you just ruined with your secondary baby-jaws isn't being controlled by a real person? Thankfully, that's a question we no longer have to ponder -- as promised, the original Aliens vs. Predator Classic 2000 has received multiplayer support on Steam, complete with Steam overlay integration. There's no support for dedicated servers, unfortunately, but we're hoping the game's age will dissuade PC gamers from boycotting it for this reason alone.

Steam has over 25 million subscribers

by Richard Mitchell { Jan 29th 2010 at 6:29PM }

Valve has announced that its digital distribution and community service, Steam, surpassed 25 million members in 2009. That's a 25-percent increase over 2008, according to Valve, with the company adding that 10 million of those members have created community profiles. Furthermore, December saw the number of simultaneous users pass 2.5 million, while average monthly gaming minutes passed 13 billion. The press release doesn't disclose specific financial numbers, though it does note that overall sales are up 225 percent over 2008, "marking the fifth straight year the platform has realized over 100 percent year-over-year growth in unit sales."

This part of the our blog post, incidentally, is where we insert a joke about the fact that Half-Life 2: Episode 3 still hasn't been released.

Bad Company 2, Mass Effect 2 top Steam best-seller list

by Randy Nelson { Jan 25th 2010 at 11:30PM }

EA must be feeling pretty good that it's got the top three best-selling games currently on Steam. It must feel even better that said games haven't even been released yet, but gamers have already paid in full to pre-load them onto their PCs ASAP.

Specifically, this week's highest grossing title on Valve's digital distribution service is Battlefield: Bad Company 2, which doesn't release until March. Mass Effect 2, which hits tomorrow, occupies the number two and three slots -- the Digital Deluxe and Standard editions, respectively. Modern Warfare 2 and Company of Heroes Complete Pack round out the top five. The latter came out last October and is certainly in some pretty good company.

Just missing the cut? BioShock 2, which is currently on sale for $5 off the $49.99 (virtual) sticker price.

[Via BigDownload]

PSA: Portal: Still Alive is $10 on Xbox Live this week

by Alexander Sliwinski { Jan 25th 2010 at 7:45PM }

Xbox Live Arcade's Portal: Still Alive stepped through an inter-spacial tear of savings and popped out the other side $5 cheaper. Valve's fantastic puzzle game, which was also Joystiq's game of the year for 2007, will be 800

($10) on XBLA this week.

Considering The Orange Box, which includes Portal (minus the 14 "exclusive" levels in Still Alive), is only $20, it may be worth it to splurge on the full package. Especially if you've never played Portal, Half-Life 2 or Team Fortress 2. Also, if you haven't played those games, we hope your decade-long excursion in the Amazon was amazing.

Add Portal: Still Alive to your download queue

Steam users adopting Windows 7 at breakneck speeds

by Griffin McElroy { Jan 24th 2010 at 9:00PM }

Though Windows 7 fever hasn't yet overwhelmed the PC community, Steam users seem to be getting on board with the latest Bill Gates-approved operating system. A recent Steam survey has revealed that a little over 23 percent of the platform's regular users have upgraded to Windows 7 -- a stark difference from the 6 percent of the total operating system market which Windows 7 currently represents.

What we found more interesting about this survey is that so many people are still using Windows XP. Then again, considering the only alternative these people have had over the past four years was the most nightmarish, user-unfriendly operating system known to man, we don't blame them for being a little gunshy when it comes to technological progress.

[Via Download Squad]

Left 4 Dead 2's Versus mode getting bots, auto-spawn tweaks

by Griffin McElroy { Jan 23rd 2010 at 11:30AM }

Question: What's the only thing scarier than a looming horde of normal-speed zombies? Answer: A looming horde of normal-speed zombies with robot brains. That's the kind of nightmare we'll soon be facing once Valve puts the finishing touches on an update for Left 4 Dead 2, which will add Infected bots to the game's Versus mode to help balance out one-on-one games.

In addition, Valve's doing some tweaking to the zombie auto-spawning which occurs during the finale events in Versus mode. Apparently, the developer decided that the average 34.56% chance of survival for the human team was a little too low, and is trying to balance things out by disabling auto-spawning during the campaigns' climaxes. Of course, none of that will matter when the human team is attempting to escape from robot zombies.

Gallery: Left 4 Dead 2

Team Fortress 2 updates won't stop after final class gets new content

by Griffin McElroy { Jan 20th 2010 at 6:00AM }

There's just one Team Fortress 2 class that's scraping by without the support of post-launch additional content: The hard hatted, begoggled Engineer. It makes sense that Valve will get to the crafty class sooner or later -- but many have wondered whether the developer will keep expanding on the title once the Engineer's update goes live. Fortunately, a Community Fortress interview with Valve's Robin Walker confirmed that new TF2 content would drop before and after the final class gets its new equipment.

When pressed about the studio's post-Engineer plans, Walker explained, "we've got multiple updates in the works still, at least one of which will land before the Engineer pack." He later added, "as always, we haven't planned too much out beyond that point, because we want to see what feedback we get from the community." Well, community? What would you like to see? Some new weapons? Different styles of hats? Any support whatsoever for the console versions of the game?

[Via 1UP]

BioShock 2 now available for prepurchase on Steam

by Mike Schramm { Jan 19th 2010 at 11:30PM }

Valve has officially announced that 2K Games' BioShock 2 will be available for purchase on Steam -- you can pre-purchase the game right now, and it'll be unlocked for play on February 9, 2010, day and date with the rest of the world. The current price is $44.99, a slight discount from the boxed version, and that includes a Steam copy of the original BioShock as well, which you can "kindly" give to a friend if you happen to already have it. Or you can nab four licenses for you and three friends for $134.97, with each of you getting to play the original also.

Sure, it's a good deal if you're not concerned with "discs" or "physical media," but does it come with a vinyl LP of the game's original soundtrack? Didn't think so, boy-o.

Game Informer: No Half-Life 2: Episode 3 for you in 2010

by Justin McElroy { Jan 19th 2010 at 3:00PM }

Now this is just demoralizing. According to a report in the rumors section of the Feb. 2010 issue of Game Informer (which doesn't name its source) there won't be "any game from the [Half-Life] franchise in 2010." As if that weren't crushing enough, the magazine says it's not even sure there will be a Half-Life 2: Episode 3, postulating that the next Gordon Freeman adventure might be Half-Life 3 proper.

Alright, listen, Half-Life: You take as long as you need, but we know you're holding Portal 2 in there somewhere. Just let GLaDOS go unharmed and you can develop until 2020 for all we care. Please, if not for us, think of the preteens waiting to record painful cover versions of "I'm Still Alive (Again)" on YouTube.

Some guy is selling his Steam account on eBay

by David Hinkle { Jan 16th 2010 at 12:45AM }

We think this is interesting for two reasons:

This is actually the first post we've ever written about some guy selling his Steam account
We can't believe someone would actually want to get rid of their Steam account

So, yeah, eBay user dave311freak is trying to unload his massive Steam collection (139 titles strong) onto whoever's willing to fork over the most cash for it. As it stands, nobody's actually dropped a bid on the auction, so we're not sure he'll be successful in this venture. Head past the break for a video rundown of some highlights from dude's collection.

[Thanks, Terry]

Continued →

Valve looking for user-created items in Team Fortress 2

by Griffin McElroy { Jan 14th 2010 at 7:45PM }

There once was a time when your only option for exercising creativity in Team Fortress 2 was to come up with clever ways to grief your fellow players. Today, Valve announced that players would soon have a less annoying way to stretch their imagination muscles -- by designing their own items and avatars which could possibly show up in-game.

Of course, you can't simply break one of the classes by creating a mini-nuke launcher for them -- there's a number of restrictions to what's appropriate for the game. Check out Valve's handy "Tips and Tricks" page to find out how to ensure your homebrewed creations are TF2-acceptable. For instance, a new fedora for the Sniper? Absolutely. A gun shaped like genitalia for the Heavy? Absolutely not.