Ever had that feeling that you really needed something, but you just couldn't put your finger on what it was? Because I have just stumbled upon such a thing, by pure chance, and I figured it might help some of you as well: the history of Zelda. And before you go sending me to Wiki or Google, why bother? When you can have one Eurogamer article to cover it all! Well... maybe not quite all (add-ons and spin-offs are omitted), and it's not just a single article either, as they only published the first part today. But once it's done, it should be a must-read for people who - like myself - have had very little (if any) contact with the Zelda universe in the past. And you wouldn't want to start playing Twilight Princess in complete "darkness", now would you?

With that in mind, Eurogamer's historical feature starts with the following introduction:

"Where some games embody particular genres and some particular themes, Zelda has always defied categorisation. These games are not RPGs, they are not puzzlers, they are not purely action games, they are not anything in particular; they are entirely themselves. It's this singular identity, on top of their ingenuity, spark and sheer character, that makes these games worthy of our respect, attention and, in so many cases, adoration. Zelda titles mark some of the most significant milestones in the history and development of videogames, and they are also the reason that thousands of people (myself included) got into gaming in the first place - they have enchanted generation after generation with their imagination, playfulness, beguiling innocence and enthralling, enticingly secretive virtual worlds."

This first article only covers the first five Zelda games: The Legend of Zelda (1986), Zelda II: The Adventure of Link (1987), The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (1992), The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening (1993), and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (1998). Over the next few days, they will continue with the second part (which picks up at Majora's Mask) and, of course, finish off with a review for the new Twilight Princess on the Wii.

If you plan on getting one (a Wii, that is), don't forget that you can also get the original Zelda game via the Virtual Console - if you'd rather relive the history first-hand.

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Despite being one of the top five rated massively-multiplayer games on MMORPG.com, The Saga of Ryzom is potentially facing immediate doom, now that its developer Nevrax is going into bankruptcy. As customary in such situations, the company's liquidation will also put the intellectual properties (namely the Ryzom game) up for taking to the highest bidder. But what's less customary is that a group of former Nevrax employees and community members are trying to buy back the game, in order to release it free of charge under the GPL license.

The "Free Ryzom!" campaign already has a website at Ryzom.org, where its initiators are calling out for fans to make donations. Eventually, they hope to gather enough money in order to purchase the source code, artwork and intellectual property associated with Ryzom, "so we can breathe new life into it as an open, democratically run player project".

Should they manage to reclaim the Ryzom universe, they also plan to further develop it and to allow the players to baiscally decide the future of this fantastic virtual world. But to get there, they will need quite a lot of money. Not millions of dollars, as it took the game to be developed, but in any case tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of dollars. And so far their "Donation Meter" indicates that they have raised over 32,000 Euros (over $42,000) - in "donation pledges".

Most of the group's confidence comes from a similar case from a few years ago, when the company behind Blender went into liquidation. But the community surrounding Blender came to the rescue and raised 100,000 Euros to purchase the software package from its investors, and to this day, Blender is a highly successful and actively developed Free Software project, maintained by its community of users.

That is the success story they seek for Ryzom. Why not give them a hand? Or at least a pledge.

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When next-gen technology meets prehistoric practices, we are confronted with the perplexing discovery that, instead of the usual sensor bar normally used to detect the movements of the Wii remote, Nintendo's new console also works with... candles! Before any kind of demystifying explanation, I think you'd better watch some movies that have already popped-up on YouTube - such as this, this or this - in which we are shown why we should always have a couple of candles at hand, just in case.

There have already been several attempts to replace the Wii console's sensor bar, last week, arguably the most notable of them being one that shows how to make your own wireless sensor-bar, by using some regular electronic components. A quite literally enlightened mind took the technological regress even further back in time, all the way to the age of candles! How is such a thing even possible?

Well, basically, all the Wiimote needs in order to "triangulate" its position are a couple of infra-red light sources (those would be the LEDs from the Wii senson bar). But since candles also emit in IR, not just visible light... ta-daaaa, it's a miracle! For a more "live" explanation, check out the second movie, accompanied by the following explanation:

"See the two candles at the top of the TV, I'm gonna use those to make the Wii detect the remote's movements. And as you can see it is clearly detecting them, and quite flawlessly I might add. Reason being, the Wiimote detects the infra-red signals from two candles, and transmits them back to the Wii. The Wii sensor bar has LEDs that emit IR, and basically it's the same thing as having two candles up there. I thought this was pretty cool."

Now that's what I call retro-compatibility!

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Far from being over, the next-gen madness has lately been focusing on "breaking" the two consoles, Wii and PlayStation 3. Regarding Nintendo's console, things aren't too complicated, yet. Or at least they don't seem to be. Most of the hacking efforts are targeted at replacing the missing Opera browser from the console's initial offering (arguably the biggest disappointment of the Wii launch). Still, even without Opera, the Wii has an internal browser that allows accessing the Wii "channels", such as the Shop Channel, which ultimately is just another website.

Unfortunately (for some), these channels can't normally be accessed with regular PC browser, and neither can the Wii browser normally access regular websites such as Google. The first part ain't so troublesome, but until the Opera browser launches on the Wii, it would be nice to at least be able to navigate (from the console) outsite of the special Nintendo channels. And, as many YouTube videos already show us, it can be done! All you have to do is tweak the console's network settings and, once "hacked", you still need to face the fact that this browser is a rather limited application - as it doesn't display, for instance, Flash objects in web pages.

At least for a short while, the first part - the one about accessing Wii channels from a PC browser - was also possible, as proven by the pictures from this website. That's also where you can learn more about "packet sniffing" Wii's communications and other such leet stuff, if you're into that sort of thing. The rest of us, let's move on to PS3 hacking.

This is where things are really starting to get interesting. From the moment they allowed the installation of an alternative operating system, such as Fedora Core 5 Linux, Sony willingly opened the gates for hackers to their next-gen console's paradise. All of a sudden, running any kind of software had become a piece of cake, so now the biggest challenge is "breaking" the PlayStation 3 games and running the pirated back-up copies that any careful gamer makes for his own, personal, selfish use.

Already a tradition for every new console (including the Xbox 360 and PSP in the past), the process of hacking games begins with "dumping" the data from an original disc, to a hard-drive. And then it continues (in theory) with making a software that allows people to run these pirated back-up copies. The first part is always easier, and it has actaully been done already last week - when the guys from PS3News.com managed to "dump" the first PS3 games (Blu-ray discs!), like Madden NFL 07 and Resistance: Fall Of Man. Obviously, it didn't take long for the first group of pirates back-... err... hackers to publicly release such a PS3 iSO, and the dumps have continued to appear ever since... But in vain, for now: there's still a long way until such a PS3 iSO will be playable.

Until then, somebody challenges us with another kind of hacking: the person who successfully hacks the PS3 that site is running on, and complies with the set conditions, will receive that PlayStation 3 console (with a replaced HDD of 160 GB, and of course Fedora Linux pre-installed), a HDMI cable, and the game Resistance. All I could find (with my Leet -15 skill) was that the website's IP is from Ichikawa, Japan. From here on... you're on your own.

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Over just a couple of days, two distinct stories have led us to believe that Microsoft will soon cut the price of their next generation console, after all, despite earlier denials from the company. The first story comes out of the UK, where Microsoft's ongoing advertising frenzy continued over the weekend. One ad in particular caught CVG's vigilant eye, during ITV's "I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here" show (actually, they claim their girlfriends made them watch it, but as of press time we were unable to get in contact touch with said girlfriends for an official confirmation... or various other things).

The ad in question showcased the swelling portfolio of Xbox 360 games, stating the price of the console as "from £199.99 RRP" - which apparently is £10 ($20) cheaper than the current price of the Xbox 360 Core System in the UK. Not a huge price cut, but a cut nevertheless.

Meanwhile, an older interview with Robbie Bach (president of Entertainment and Devices at Microsoft) conducted by Mercury News a couple of weeks ago was finally transcribed, and among other things (Zune and stuff) it also reveals some juicy bits of comment from Bach, regarding the topic at hand:

"(...) The second thing you have to look at is economics. You have to ask the question, over the life cycle, who has the cost advantage? Who can price most effectively? Who can reach the price points quicker? That has a huge impact on what gets driven.

Q: Price points for hardware?

A: Yes. (...) Because we are out there first, we have a bigger installed base of consoles. We can drive down the manufacturing curve sooner and faster. And because we designed a box that was fundamentally easier to manage on costs, we’re going to have that advantage.

(...)

Q: So are you thinking about Xbox 720?

A: You know how these things work. The engineering team is always thinking about the future. Right now we are thinking about how to cost reduce the Xbox 360. That seems to be the first order of business."

But just because cutting the price of the Xbox 360 ranks high on Microsoft's list of priorities, it doesn't mean that it will happen as soon as Christmas 2006. In fact, later in the interview Bach basically says that there's no point in cutting the price, as long as Sony has trouble delivering enough PlayStation 3 units in the US. And since Sony's troubles aren't about to give in soon, we reckon the same goes for Xbox 360's firm price point. For now.

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IL-2 Sturmovik: 1946 Flies For Gold With New Trailer

For whatever reason, Ubisoft chose to first announce in German that their upcoming IL-2 Sturmovik: 1946 flight simulator has reached Gold status, confirming that it will meet its release date previously set for December 7, 2006. Complementing the good news is a new '46 trailer we have added today for local streaming and download. This in-game footage trailer shows some of the new aircraft models added in Sturmovik 1946 - such as vertical take-off aircrafts, jet planes, bombers and more.

The final packshot was also recently revealed by Ubi, along with a brief list of what fans of Oleg Maddox' series will find in the new IL-2 Sturmovik: 1946.

1946 includes:

- The PE-2 campaign

- The Sturmoviks over Manchuria campaign

- The 1946 campaign (after one we name the product)

- A detailed 450 pages long Plane Guide (in UK only)

- Exclusive videos making of videos (in UK only)

- Exclusive glance at Storm of War: Battle of Britain

And also:

- Il-2 Forgotten Battles

- Ace Expansion Pack

- Pacific Fighters

- All the latest patches

So, as you can see, all of the previous IL-2 series content will be there for the taking, along with new campaigns, missions and aircraft, plus many exclusive features - thus bringing the most respected anthology flight simulator to an astonishing 229 flyable aircraft and over 300 total aircraft!

Among the 32 new flyable fighters and bombers, fans will be pleased to find the long-awaited Il-10 Sturmovik, the Mig-9 Jet fighter or the Arado Ar-234 Blitz bomber, which they will be able to fly in nine new campaigns for the German, Soviet and Japanese air forces. Three of the nine campaigns are a departure into alternate history, focusing on hypothetical battles between the Soviet Union and Germany in the year 1946 where WWII still rages on. Both the VVS and Luftwaffe now have access to advanced jet and rocket fighters.

Some of the new maps featured in these campaigns will cover the Kiev region, a Manchuria region map focusing on the border between the USSR, China and Japanese-occupied Korea, a large bonus Burma map and an online Khalkin Gol / Nomonhan map.

All in all, I guess you could say this is the ultimate IL-2 Sturmovik pack... to date.

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After silently having slipped past its previous release dates for a couple of times, I was beginning to have my doubts that the devs from CCP will manage to deploy the EVE Online: The Path to Kali expansion in time for Christmas this year. But thankfully they will, albeit under a different title. As announced on the EVE website, the new expansion will be called Revelations, and its first chapter will be deployed tomorrow, November 28.

This will of course lead to an extended dowtime on the Tranquility server, running for 24 hours from Tuesday morning at 02:00, to 02:00 GMT Wednesday. Once that's done, EVE Online: Revelations will bring a wealth of new features, content, improvements, optimizations and fixes both to server and client. Detailed Patch Notes are available for registered users only, but everyone can check out the Revelations Features listed on the official website.

As you may know, this will mark the beginning of the second major expansion in the EVE Online saga - the first one being Exodus, with its two instalments: Cold War and Red Moon Rising. Revelations will be the first of three instalments in EVE's second expansion, in which the empires make their final push towards the brink of war. Uncharted regions of space will open for pilots to explore, yielding vast wealth and the untapped resources needed to feed a hungry war machine. New innovations in weapons technology will provide pilots with the means to wage the battle for supremacy in the universe of EVE. Here are Revelations' main features:

- Contracts - Term-driven, enforceable work agreements between pilots

- Combat Organization - Enhanced situational awareness, command hierarchies in gang formations, and fleet broadcasts

- Exploration - Discover the wealth hidden in the massive void between the stars

- Invention - The secrets of Tech II technology revealed through intrepid engineering opportunities

- Combat Boosters - A temporary burst of enhanced combat abilities, but at a cost

- Rigs - Recover and utilize the unscathed technology of shipwrecks

- New Battleships - The newest flagships of fleet warfare unleashed

- New Battlecruisers - The versatile gunship evolves for the challenges ahead

- Salvaging - Sift through the wreckage of shattered ships to recover materials for Rigs

- Eight New Regions - Immense opportunities for conquests and riches as the horizons of EVE continue to expand

Soon after Revelations, Chapter 1 is deployed, CCP will roll out another important (and long-awaited) addition in December: voice communication. By integrating the Vivox technology in the game, real-time voice chat will finally be possible between players, without them having to resort to other third-party applications. Looks like another happy Christmas for EVE Online, then.

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Baja Mania And Baja Destruction Racing Onto The Wii

Previously known to be in development for the PlayStation 2 over at Broadsword Interactive, Baja Mania and Baja Destruction will (also) be heading to Nintendo's Wii console early next year, as announced over the weekend by publisher Conspiracy Entertainment Europe. Both games are carrying a Q1 2007 release timeframe, and will of course take full advantage of the Wiimote, promising to offer "exciting and hard fought combat and driving skills where fortitude will win the day".

The concept itself of "Baja racing" originates from the Southern California desert on the Baja peninsula. Competitors vie with each other to build the ultimate off-road racer - the better the suspension, tyres and, of course, the obligatory roll cage, the better the chances of winning.

The first game, Baja Mania, will stay closer to this concept, by drawing its inspiration from the desert around Palm Springs (where Broadsword Interactive collected the reference material for a previous game, Dakar Rally). Baja Mania will feature several types of vehicles - including 3 types of dune buggy (4 wheel), 3 types of 'cat' (6 wheel), 3 types of truck (8 wheels) - and each vehicle will have 3 variants to represent the different teams battling it out in races of up to 15 competitors.

"Baja Mania's uniqueness presents aggressive and responsive AI that allows tight competition via checkpoints that must be crossed in order. Players will capture the flags on each checkpoint and display them on their aerial to prove that you were the first through."

The other one, Baja Destruction, will be more of a fantasy driving game, sort of Baja racing meets Mad Max.

"Its uniqueness is in the fact that the stakes are much higher, the aggression and adrenalin required to complete the race by annihilating the opposition make for total destruction, with an arsenal of weapons and plenty of upgradeables.

Races consist of 15 competitors with 3 different teams for each of the 3 variants within each of the 3 classes. There are 3 types of terrain and 3 variants of each which have totally different courses laid out within them. They take place within an arena of approximately 400 sq. metres.

As well as the vehicle performance upgrades, there are 2 main types of weapon. Each has 3 variations for increasing power and accuracy and variants that go from merely forward firing to auto-targeting (homing)."

We're already beginning to see two very different approaches to simulating driving on the Wii. These two Baja games and Excite Truck, for instance, only use the Wii remote to control the vehicle, by tilting it sideways. But it seems a lot more "hardcore" (and realistic) the way they're doing it in Call of Duty 3 - where driving stages are controlled with both the Wiimote and the Nunchuck, sort of like gripping a real steering wheel with both hands. I for one would like to see more of that!

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You know you live on the wrong continent, when the powers that be go crazy over games with a wee-bit of sexual content (as is often the case in the US), or when they take a random stand against games with what they say is an unhealthy amount of violence (the Germans are clearly over-doing it, but so are the Aussies). Of course, that doesn't leave us with many continents to live on, aside from heavenly Asia. Or more precisely Japan, where Rule of Rose - Europe's latest troublemaker game - originates from.

About a week ago, Gamasutra was reporting that the mayor of Rome and Europe's justice and security commissioner Franco Frattini were describing the PlayStation 2 horror game Rule of Rose as containing "obscene cruelty and brutality". This was followed by a very negative press coverage in two British newspapers, The Daily Mail and The Times. According to MCV, The Times wrote that the game's 19-year-old heroine Jennifer is "beaten, gagged and buried alive", also mentioning "among other horrors, a rat being pushed into a girl's face", and accusing the game of "alleged overtones of lesbianism and sadomasochism".

Apparently, things got blown out of proportion so much, that the game's European publisher 505 Games decided not to release the game in the UK, after all.

"Following discussions with our retail and publishing partners, 505 Games has taken the decision not to publish Rule of Rose in the UK at this time."

And that, despite The Video Standards Council's angry reaction to the press coverage, accusing the newspapers of inventing non-existent scenarios in the game. VSC secretary general Laurie Hall told MCV:

"I have no idea where the suggestion of in-game sadomasochism has come from, nor children being buried underground. These are things that have been completely made up.

(...) There isn't any underage eroticism, and the most violent scene does indeed see one of the young girls scare Jennifer with a rat on a stick. But the rat's actually quite placid towards her and even licks her face.

(...) I wouldn't call the game violent. We're not worried about our integrity being called into question, because Mr. Frattini's quotes are nonsense."

Nonsense or not, the game clearly touches on some rather delicate themes - but hey, that's what the "Mature" rating is for! The developers themselves admitted that Rule of Rose could easily be perceived as perverted or erotic, but it's really just a matter of perspective.

"We sort of wanted to show not only how scary adults can be from a child's perspective, because that's been touched on many times, but also how scary children can be from an adult's perspective. We want to see that contrast.

(...) If we look at it through the eyes of adults, when girls play with each other in this way it may be considered somewhat erotic, but with kids, I... really don't think they'd see it that way. It's more genuine, not lustful. It may appear so because these are things kids actually do, but we don't want to see."

Interestingly, Gamasutra saw this coming a long time ago, back in Summer when most of the gaming world was too busy keeping its sight on the likes of Jack Thompson. At that time, they said that Rule of Rose may be 2006's most controversial game. And you know what, I think they were right!

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If you're still not tired of all the Gears of War news appearing over the past couple of weeks, you might be interested to know that, as far as the game's story and its devs from Epic are concerned, there is still room for plenty more episodes in the series. What it all comes down to, eventually, is how well will each episode sell. And since the first Gears of War has already sold 1 million copies worldwide in the first two weeks, you can bet your dearest possessions (and your stashed-up PS3 money) that there will be a Gears of War 2 sequel. And maybe then some.

Cliff "CliffyB" Bleszinski from Epic Games has long since hinted that he would like to make a Gears of War trilogy, but it wasn't until a few days ago that a Microsoft official (Jeff Bell, VP of Global Marketing) referred to the game's universe as a trilogy, in an interview with GameDaily:

"The goal of this ad is to establish Marcus Fenix as the hero of the Gears of War trilogy. The intention is to create emotional connection with him that is lacking in typical third-person action title marketing, by communicating a sense of desperation, loneliness, overwhelming odds, and the ultimate futility of the situation he faces."

"Gears is a trilogy?" - Epic Games VP, Mark Rein tends to disagree on the official forums, but for the best!

"If we can keep making quality games that fans obviously love then why would we have to stop at three? (...) There's definitely, as many of you have pointed out, a lot more to learn about what's really happening on the plant [sic] Sera and in the lives of the members of Delta Squad.

(...)

If Gears had flopped we certainly wouldn't be thinking about a sequel. So when we said "let's wait and see how the first one does before we commit to a second" we definitely meant it. Likewise the same is true for third or fourth, or seventh or tenth I think we made it clear that this game is part of a bigger story and if this one did well then the story would unfold in another one."

But before the Gears of War 2 as-good-as-official sequel enters full-scale production, Epic still has more in store for the first one, in terms of downloadable content and various enhancements. "We're not ready to provide any details yet", Mark teases, "but I assure you we're on the job". Well then, keep up the good job!

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