UK’s Mike Singleton dead at 61
The industry lost one of its pioneers early last week, although the news is just now spreading to the public. British game developer Mike Singleton, a major influence on the ZX Spectrum and early PC games as well as the recent GRID, passed away on October 10th after a year-long fight against jaw cancer. A former employee and friend composed a list of Singleton’s accredited games over on Giant Bomb, and it goes without saying that his influence helped to shape the early stages of gaming.
GRID was a pretty great game, but unfortunately that’s the only game of his that I can claim knowledge of in any real respect. It’s very sad to see such an important figure pass away, and I feel like this is a name that many people nowadays – myself included – might not understand the significance of. Hopefully he won’t fade into obscurity as time moves on.
[Source: Giant Bomb]
Lionhead Studios loses “less than 10% of their workforce” as they move on to new projects
The jury may yet be out on Fable: the Journey’s on-rails status (hint: it is on rails), but it seems that muddled reviews and adequate sales have forced UK’s Lionhead Studios to undergo a “consultancy process”, Eurogamer reports. The Microsoft-acquired studio is hoping to find places for affected employees in different Microsoft Games Studios, but Lionhead isn’t slowing down in the meantime. They’ll be moving on to new projects, including what might be a potential MMORPG for the next Xbox.
It’s never a good thing to see layoffs, especially in a company that put out some pretty great games at one point in time. I haven’t been the biggest fan of Fable for the past few entries in the series, and the idea of an on-rails Kinect-venture is not one that seems appealing to me. Thankfully, with such a small amount of people having to change their job titles in the near future, we might be able to see Lionhead making some really cool games in the future.
In a related question, this reporter wants to know: where’s my Black and White 3?
[Source: Eurogamer]
Deadly Premonition: The Director’s Cut announced as a PS3 exclusive
Let’s get some good news going in this Evening Report, shall we? Early this morning, Rising Star Games announced that cult hit Deadly Premonition would be seeing a PS3 re-release as a “Director’s Cut”, including new content, an updated control scheme that includes Move controls and the ubiquitous HD graphics that may or may not have been in the 360 version to begin with. Playstation fans will be able to enjoy Swery’s confounding tale of FBI Special Agent Francis York Morgan sometime in Q1 next year.
I haven’t gotten a chance to play Deadly Premonition in any form yet, and as such this might be the version that finally gets me to pull the trigger. Knowing its status as a “love it or hate it” kind of game gives it an interesting status on my list of things I’m still trying to play, but with so many games coming out between now and the nebulous quarter-wide timetable right now, I hope I can devote enough time to investigate Anna Morgan’s murder. If you’ve played through the game, which category does it fall into for you: love or hate?
[Source: Joystiq]
Skyrim beta files get dug into, pointing to Dragonborn DLC
Someone at Bethesda really needs to think about putting their DLC files into beta patches, or they’re not going to have any announcements ever again. Rock Paper Shotgun spotted a group of Bethesda forum-goers digging into the recent Skyrim 1.8 beta patch and the things they’ve uncovered point to an expansion called Dragonborn. The contents within are…pretty intriguing. By pretty intriguing, I mean dragon mounts and Morrowind. Dragon. Mounts. Morrowind. I’m getting excited just thinking about it. The files point at a handful of “DragonMounted.txt” files, as well as locations that directly reference Solstheim. For those of you who don’t remember the best Elder Scrolls game, Solstheim served as the frosty island for Morrowind’s second expansion, Bloodmoon.
Given the fact that Hearthfire (and Dawnguard, if memory serves) were both spotted in this exact same manner, I have to believe that this is a pretty legitimate peek at the next chunk of DLC to drop into Skyrim. The thought of having a dragon mount is cool and all, and new weapons to use while on those dragons are cool…but Morrowind! How wondrous would it be to actually get a chance to see an Elder Scrolls location for a second time, way down the series’ timeline? If nothing else, maybe there will be more to that little werewolf quest chain that the Companions had in the base game.
[Source: Rock Paper Shotgun]
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Dyl-Questing – The Best Thing I Read Today: Make Your Move
Over at the Penny Arcade Report, Ben Kuchera sat down with Dance Central 3’s project director Matt Boch to talk about the technology and tweaking behind the game’s “Make Your Move” mode, a game type that allows players to make their own moves rather than shuffling down a list of Harmonix-approved grooves. It’s a tech-heavy discussion but a fascinating look into making the Kinect do something that it isn’t designed to handle well.
[Source: Penny Arcade Report]
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