Darwinia for Windows, Linux and soon for Mac.

Taking a rare break from WoW this weekend, I downloaded the demo for Introversion Software’s “Darwinia” and was impressed enough to buy it soon after.

This game reminds me of “classic” games in that it’s fun, very creative, simple and deep.

The simple part is the interface — you get a cool gesture-based task manager and a simple point and click interface. The navigation is brilliant — very fluid and almost casual — you’re not working, you’re not trying really hard — in fact in the beginning you’re just like “hey, what’s this? can I click here? oh.. that’s cool…”

Then you realize that you’re having fun trying to destroy these “viruses” with your squads and reclaiming the bits for Darwinians (little builders that run things). Ok, so now the game is taking on definate RTS elements.

Now, as you play further, you suddenly realize that the game goals you were given were very loose and open-ended. No waypoints, no specific “Starcraft” like goals…. it dawns on you — this is potentially a very deep game in the number of different strategies and things you can try out.

Which brings you back to play. This game is a strategy/virtual life.. playground.

It’s simple, elegant and for the work of two small-shop UK developers, simply brilliant!

Read the IGN review for more info.

And best of all - it works.

Absurd Genius: PSP Web Portal: “PSP Web Portal

If you have a PSP, set your Primary DNS server to 67.171.70.72 — I’ve got a portal of sorts up. Set your secondary DNS to your router so if my IP changes or my machine goes down, you’ll still be able to access the internet. Then just fire up Wipeout and head to the downloads section, you should see this:
“

It may not be games, but the Force.net is reporting this, and it relates to that Star Wars Lego game.
ON that note.. has anyone played that? I’m dying to find out how it is!

LEGO Star Wars Movie on Cartoon Network

Posted By Britany on March 23, 2005

The March/April issue of LEGO magazine features an ad for a LEGO Star Wars movie.

It’s set to air May 8th on Cartoon Network at 7pm ET/PT.

Click here to check out a photo of the magazine ad, which features LEGO General Grievous. Thanks to Jedimom for the pic, and everyone else who sent in alerts.

Go here for FREE PSP Movie Loader. It’s normally $19.99 but it’s free today.

29HDN - PSP Guide

How stuff works has a killer feature on Revolution.

Stuffo “The Nintendo Revolution”: “In a Business Week interview at the 2005 Game Developer’s Conference in San Francisco, Nintendo’s President Satoru Iwata said, ‘Games already pretty much have reached the point of photo-realism. Working on more intense graphics is not the only path we can take anymore. Simply relying on the sheer horsepower of the machine will not bring the industry a bright future.’
“

ThinkGeek :: GameOptics LCD Display: “he first production run of the GameOptics X1620 is ready to meet its public! With more than a year in development, this USB LCD has been designed with the PC gamer in mind to enhance the gaming experience. Now you can frag away, while still keeping up to date with your PC’s instant messaging software, incoming emails, MP3 and internet radio playback, even check the weather - All without having to interrupt your gaming session.”

Fresh speculation about the capabilities of Microsoft’s next-generation Xbox Live service has emerged, with the US Official Xbox Magazine reporting that users will be able to create and sell their own custom content in some games.

Ok. If this turns out to be true, this would be a brilliant move. Imagine the concept:

We all play Halo2. I make a cool mod, or map, and I release it to the community via XBOX2’s infrastructure. I make money by selling the mod. WHich I love. People play the mod and love it because its good work, which They love. Microsoft acts like Ebay and takes a small cut of every transaction, which they love. The developers of the original game may also be able to exact a small fee because its built using their tools / built for their game. BRILLIANT! The only flaw I see is trying to build a map or somehting using the XBOX xontroller.

But wow… i hoipe this is true. Great idea.

Gamespy has its first article on Spore. It looks like no new info other than whats already out there, but I figured I’d pass it on.

Is it me, or does this feel like a good coming year for E3?

Star Trek Online first details - PC News at GameSpot: “We recently had a chance to sit down with developer Perpetual Entertainment for a cursory ’sneak preview’ of some of the features in this upcoming online game. Apparently, the developer has the rights to draw upon content from any of the Star Trek series, including the classic TV show from the 1960s on up to the modern-day shows Deep Space Nine and Enterprise.”

Will Wright The Creator of Simcity and The Sims was scheduled to give a GDC presentation on Friday featuring the future of game design. His demo was to show how multiple styles of gameplay can fit into one title.

As the presentation unfolded the press began to realize that this was 2 presentations in one. Will was showing off his next opus - Spore. A game that leads you from arcade-like gameplay as microscopic organism, all the way through it’s evolutionary process, the creation of its race, the colonization of its planet, and eventually to a grand space-opera game where you command your civilization to take over the Galaxy. Ambitious.

Because this took everyone by surprise, stories are popping up slowly on the net. I believe 1Up.com was the first to report, but since then IGN.com has also posted a preview.

Here’s what we know so far - the game was working during the presentation. A lot of the core of the programming seems to have already been done and the title already exhibits “polish”. The game moves through 6 phases - Cellular [arcade] -> Physical Evolution [Hack and Slash] -> Social Phase [Populous] -> City Management [City Builder/SimCity] -> Global Domination [Strategy] -> Galactic Colonization [Space Opera]. In a great stroke of design Wright will incorporate the Internet into the game - Civilizations can be uploaded to the Internet by everyone. The game will then download civs to populate your galaxy with - so you’ll be playing against the creations of other players. Very cool.

In the creature design phase you’ll be given a lump of clay to mold your critters. You’ll also have stencil tools that are “Mr Potatohead-like”. Expect to play against wide variety of original creations. Apparently they’ve also spent time minimizing the data footprint needed to store whole galaxies - so they’re targeting not only PCs and consoles, but portable devices as well (and with the Nintendo DS going online… )

Early information about this title looks very cool. We should expect more news at E3 including screenshots, release date and a helluva lot more in depth previews and Q&A sessions.