Archive for category U

Ha! This is great stuff. If I had UT3, I’d definitely check this out.

I’ve been playing Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom a lot with a friend of mine (Steve), and I’ve been enjoying it quite a bit. Steve and I have played through Baldur’s Gate I, most of Baldur’s Gate II (still working on it), and the two Champions of Norrath games several times each. Can you tell we’re big action RPG fans? (I just ordered the PS2 game Bard’s Tale as well. Unfortunately it’s only one player, but I like this type of game a lot, so…)

I’m not saying that Untold Legends doesn’t have problems, because it does. But I think the pluses outweigh the minuses, so I thought I’d list them here to help you make a decision if you’re an RPG fan.

Bad:

• Characters Get Stuck
  Our characters get stuck on the level geometry quite a bit, and it’s really annoying to always be tweeking your character around to get by obstacles that should be easy to navigate.
• Multiplayer Gaming Untested
  It looks like SOE did very little local multiplayer testing. Why do I say that? We can’t even load a two player game without starting a two player campaign from scratch first! That’s right. If we enter the game and load up the last game we played, it won’t work. We have to start a new two player game from scratch, wait through the cinematics and opening dialog, and then load our game. At least we only need to do this once per evening, but it’s very annoying. Update: As Jason suggested, hitting X works. Though I’m sure we tried that before. Ah well. But still, X is not the standard for this situation – START is. This is an inconsitency that has caused me much grief!
• Uninspired Level Design
  We recently left the caves and boy was I glad! They were boring! Other parts of the game so far have been better, however. The graphics for the level geometry are rather bland as well. Some parts look better than others, but the caves look especially bad.
• No Health/Mana Potions
  We’ve come to expect health potions to come along and save the day when playing games like this, and now we’re stuck in a game where health only comes from killing monsters. Somewhat of a downer.

Good:

• Great Special FX
  Spells in combat have some great special effects, and the eye candy is fun to watch. I haven’t tired of it yet.
• Great Character Modelling
  So far we haven’t met a huge variety of bad guys, but what we have seen is well done. Our main characters are also well modelled and look great. It looks like SOE spent a lot of time getting the characters right.
• Combat is Fun
  This is where the game really shines. Game like Champions of Norrath give you a single ranged attack, a single melee attack, and spells. But Untold Legends has a combo system so that you can perform all sorts of fun attacks. As well, I always play a non-wizard character while Steve always plays a wizard. He usually gets some cool spells and I usually get stuck with boring ones. But in Untold Legends I’m getting some pretty fun spells to use in combat, and they’re great. For example, I recently gained the ability to teleport over to an enemy, slash him up a bit, and then teleport back. It’s been handy and fun at the same time! This feature – the fun combat – is basically what makes the game for me. If combat wasn’t so good, I wouldn’t be playing this game.

So there you have it. It’s a game with many flaws, but the combat makes up for it. At least that’s the way I see it. I hope that Steve drops by and adds his comments too!

As Darrin pointed out in the shoutbox, UT3 has its first user-created content. It’s a small multiplayer map called DM-Shrine, created by a modder for the PC.

It looks like the Epic folks took this map and baked it for the PS3 for our enjoyment. So the question becomes: how does one import this map into UT3 on the PS3? Here are the steps, right from Epic:

1. Unzip the file to the root directory of any memory card that is readable by your PlayStation 3. It is already in the proper directory structure but, just in case, the path and filename need to be: ps3\savedata\blus30086-modimport\userdata.jam
2. Boot up Unreal Tournament 3 on your PS3
3. Go to the “Community” menu
4. Choose “My Content”
5. Press the [SQUARE] button to “Import Mod”
6. Follow the directions on the screen to import it from your memory card.

I’m a bit confused by the first step which says to use the “root” directory and then gives an example that is not the root. Oh well.

Have any of you who own UT3 on the PS3 given this a try?

UT3 on PS3 Gets First User-created mod

Supposedly this has been known for a while, but even following the development of the game, I’ve never come across this small little tidbit: UT3 for the PS3 has no splitscreen mode!

Colour me crazy if you want, but this totally breaks the deal for me. I was SO looking forward to getting UT3 for the PS3, downloading and installing mods, and having fragfests with my friends. But no. There’s no splitscreen, so scratch the whole actually-enjoying-the-game aspect of UT3.

This sucks.

A couple Unreal Tournament 3 reviews for you today, starting with 1UP:

As for today, the arrival of Unreal Tournament 3 stands to be one of the highlights of the year for Net-connected PS3 owners. For many, this will be a fresh experience, lessening the impact of the modest mode options and lack of some fan favorites from prior versions. At the same time, the lessons learned over the years of iteration and the sparkling new graphics engine make this the latest and greatest version for fans of the series. While that experience factor also benefits the bot A.I., that shine may wear off fairly fast for those not planning to play online.

Unreal Tournament 3 Playstation 3 Review

IGN doesn’t give a full review just yet. They have an “impressions” post, where they state at the end:

In the meantime, you should know that all signs point to this being an excellent version of Unreal Tournament 3, offering a unique and enjoyable brand of FPS action.

Unreal Tournament 3 First Impressions

Good news there on the review and impressions. Now for the bad news. If you were to go out and buy the PC version of UT3 in order to put together a level for import into your PS3 version, you’d be out of luck. The tools for cooking a level for PS3 export are not available yet. On the Epic forums, they say:

However, the PS3 mod tools aren’t quite ready yet. We are working through some final legal/release issues.

When it’s ready, you will need to download the latest PC patch and another PS3 Mod Tools “patch” that adds the full PS3 mod support to the PC version.

You will have to cook ypur mods for the PS3 specifically. You will also need removable media (memory card, USB drive, etc) to transfer the mod from your PC to your PS3.

We will have the tools ready ASAP!!

So the tools are coming. Just be patient.

Edit: CVG put up three cool PS3 UT3 videos.

Gamasutra has a great interview with Mark Rein up on their website. Here’s a snippet about user-created content on the PS3 (imported to the PS3, created on the PC):

BS: To me, that seems to be a bit of a conceptual leap, in terms of how people are trying to run stuff. Maybe I’ve got it all wrong.

MR: No, that’s what’s so special about this game. We’re enabling people not just to move the furniture around in the levels we give them. You’ve seen in-game level editors, and that’s essentially what they do. They let you move blocks and stuff they already created around, and in the most sophisticated one, maybe it lets you make terrain and things like that. We’re divorcing ourselves from that kind of ridiculousness.

This is the full power of the Unreal Editor. The same editor we used to create the games is now available to you. You want to import your objects you made in 3D Studio Max or Maya? Bring them in! You want to code an UnrealScript? Code an UnrealScript! All those things you can do. If they fit on our map, you can stick them on the PlayStation 3 and they’ll run!

BS: How does exactly that go through you?

MR: It doesn’t go through us.

CN: Does Sony not care?

MR: It’s user-created content! It’s fantastic! I can’t understand why people are so nervous about what Sony… no, Sony’s wonderful. When they embrace user-created content, that’s what it means to be an open system. That’s why we’re on PlayStation 3 first — because they are embracing user-created content. It’s not just moving the deck chairs around the boat. They are embracing real art.

I wish every game did this! Wouldn’t it be cool to take those maps you know are coming for CoD4 PC version, and play them on your PS3?

The Unreal Man: Mark Rein Speaks