Age of Mythology
-- The Age of Empires series is one of the most popular gaming
franchises ever, but Ensemble's not content to coast on thier laurels.
The big move to 3D gets made with Age of Mythology, which features
heroes, monsters, and a single-player campaign narrative that will
attempt to out-Starcraft Starcraft's. Check
out our preview here. Dungeon
Siege -- Simple, elegant, and
beautiful, Dungeon Siege is yet another title from the Microsoft booth that left us dazed
and amazed. Combining the immersive
elements of a role-playing game with over-the-top intensity and non-stop action, Dungeon
Siege plunges you into a continuous 3D fantasy world where you face off against an army of
evil that has been unleashed. You begin as a humble farmer (or farm girl), and as you
travel through the world and gain new skills, you can gather a party of up to eight
characters to aid you. Dungeon Siege's fusion of action RPG and RTS controls impels the
player into one over-the-top battle after the other as the storyline unfolds and a larger
plot begins to reveal itself. Dungeon Siege incorporates fully animated 3D
characters, over-the-top battles, intense special effects and awe-inspiring vertical
landscapes. With true 3D environments and an advanced particle system for spells and
dungeons that can extend in three dimensions, Dungeon Siege keeps the player focused on
the action by providing tools such as drag select, way points and formations.
Empire Earth
-- Ever
wish you could play a game that combined the excitement and looks of an RTS game like Age
of Empires with the depth and grand scale of a turn-based game like Civ II? Well, so did
Rick Goodman, the lead designer of the original Age of Empires. But instead of just
moaning about it, like we all do, he actually came up with a game that hopes to
bridge those genres. Empire Earth allows you to guide a civilization from the moment it
comes out of the trees to the age of nanotechnology. No more of this punk "just
the middle ages" stuff--Empire Earth covers 500,000 years of human history. Of
course, that's quite an epic undertaking, so if you just want a quick game, you can choose
to limit your contest to one of the 12 different epochs. Like Age of
Mythology, this one's coming to you in 3D, and I guarantee players will
spend a lot of time just zooming in on the great-looking unit models and
terrain during battles. It's close to being finished, and it's at the
very top of my list.
Hostile Waters:
Antaeus Rising -- Without a doubt, Dan
Kingdom's demo for three of us attending the Interplay area was one of the best we'd seen at
this year's E3--like a trio of slack
jawed yokels, we were mesmerized from the start. The year is 2032. The
entire world is at peace for the first time. Together, the human race is moving to become
a world civilization--until the bombings start. A cabal of Old World magnates are working
together to destabilize the planet and return it to its fractured, hate-ridden war economy
past. The cabal organize their forces from a spiral of twenty remote artificial islands in
the Pacific...but there is something, moldering at the bed of the ocean. The last of the
Adaptive Cruisers, a carrier armed with an onboard nanofactory capable of generating
tanks, attack choppers and fighter planes. To save the world for eternal peace,
humanity must learn how to go to war again...to take back the future, they must kill for
peace. Antaeus Rising is due out any time now and will deservedly carry a
"Mature" rating, a sign of the uncompromising narrative embedded in this
well-crafted tale.
Max Payne -- Man,
this is gonna be a good one! Developed by Remedy
Entertainment and produced by 3D Realms, Max Payne is an uncompromising, story-driven game
about a man on the edge, fighting for his justice while uncovering plot-twists and twisted
thugs in the gritty bowels of New York during the century's worst blizzard.
It all ripped apart in a New York
minute...Max Payne became a man with nothing to lose in the violent, cold urban night. A
fugitive undercover cop framed for murder, he's hunted by cops and the mob alike. A man
with his back against the wall, fighting a battle he cannot hope to win. Prepare for a new
class of intense gameplay with unprecedented cinematic depths of believability. Max
Payne has game-of-the-year written all over it, and we can't wait to get our hands on
it--somehow this year's E3 demo was even more fascinating that last year's (and yes, it
was on our best-of list in 2000 too!)
Medal of Honor
-- The
inspired offspring of the Quake III engine and Saving Private Ryan, EA's
Medal of Honor is our most-anticipated FPS of the year. You had to stand
in a long line to get a glimpse of this one, but it was well worth it.
Unlike Activision's Return to Wolfenstein, (which also looks fabulous)
this one focuses on "realistic" gameplay--it's got just a dash
of Rainbow Six in it. You'll play the role of a WWII Ranger, and fight
through several settings, including such Ryan-inspired ones as Omaha
Beach and "Snipertown".
Neverwinter Nights
-- (NWN) is a new Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (AD&D) roleplaying game from
BioWare, the developers of Baldur's Gate and Tales of the Sword Coast. Neverwinter Nights
has been designed specifically for the online, multiplayer environment and the latest in
3D technology and also allows you to experience all the magic of pen-and-paper
Dungeon-Mastering on your home computer! Using Neverwinter Nights' powerful and
user-friendly Neverwinter Toolset, you can create and populate entire new modular worlds
and stories for others to adventure in. As an all-powerful Dungeon Master (DM),
Neverwinter Nights even allows you to alter the plot, possess characters, and manage
combat from behind the scenes, all in real-time. This was yet another fab demo from
the Interplay booth that started with Marc Holmes building a level with the Neverwinter
toolset. He made it, he started gameplay, he blew us away! Using the BioWare
Aurora Engine, NWN still looks as good as it did a year ago (remember the falling
leaves?)--it's a title we continue to crave.
Return
to Wolfenstein -- My brother still insists that Wolfenstein 3D is id Software's best
game. Of course that's just crazy, but I gotta admit that it had some of id's best
villains--Nazis. Boy, I hate those guys. With Return to Wolfenstein, Activision and id let
you take the role of B.B. Blazkowicz, an allied agent who must undermine an evil Nazi plot
to create an army of undead mutant super-soldiers. I'm sold right now. I mean, what could
possibly be better than a game featuring undead mutant Nazi super-soldiers? Well, how
about one that uses the Quake III engine, looks amazing, and features a dynamic plot?
Try to imagine Where Eagles Dare meets Night of
the Living Dead. Then try to imagine how big this game is going to be.
Sigma
-- Undoubtedly
the winner of "quirkiest title of the year", Microsoft and
Relic's Sigma: The Adventures of Rex Chance is an RTS. But it's like no RTS you've ever seen before,
as your units are made of animals--uh, mutated animals. In Sigma,
you'll be able to crossbreed about 50 different types of animals to
create thousands of different unit types. We didn't see much actual
gameplay, and the game is about a year away from completion, but we got
a tremendous kick out of combining a gorilla and a crab. Even at this early stage
the
"mutation" interface for Sigma is elegant and frankly a lot of fun. The 3D models look superb and funny,
and while Relic (makers of Homeworld) is certain to provide a great
single-player campaign and multiplayer, I know I could spend hours just
messing with creating new species. In a year when there wasn't a ton of
innovation on display at E3, Sigma is a welcome exception.
Warcraft
III -- Of all the games I saw at E3, Warcraft III by Blizzard will, I
think, be the next show-stopping title that gets millions of people to
gratefully drop fifty bucks. During
the convention, several members of the GamesFirst! crew crowded around
the demonstration monitor, and I watched their jaws drop without a
booth-babe in sight. WC III
was spectacular to look on, and as the demonstration progressed, I
almost bum-rushed the keyboard jockey to get my hands on a little
playtime.
--Rick
Fehrenbacher & Al Wildey |