Daily Archives: December 6, 2024

Games, Gaming, News

Prologue & Artemis – What’s next for PUBG Creator Brendan Greene

Brendan Greene, the mastermind behind the wildly popular battle royale game PUBG (PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds), has provided exciting updates on his forthcoming projects, Prologue and Artemis. Greene also announced the launch of a free tech demo called Preface, offering players a tantalizing glimpse into the innovative technology and expansive worlds his studio is developing.

Prologue: The Beginning of a New Journey

Initially teased several years ago, Prologue is envisioned as a prelude to a much larger and more ambitious project. In his latest update, Greene described Prologue not just as a game, but as a “unique exploration of procedural generation”. The goal is to create vast, immersive worlds using advanced algorithms, providing players with endless exploration opportunities without repetitive or predefined landscapes.

Prologue is designed to test and showcase the underlying technology that will be central to Greene’s ultimate vision: Artemis. The game will challenge players to survive and navigate through a dynamically generated environment, using only the resources they can gather. This concept aims to push the boundaries of current gaming experiences by offering truly unpredictable and unique adventures every time.

Artemis: An Ambitious Vision

Artemis, Greene’s highly anticipated main project, promises to be a groundbreaking undertaking. Described as an “Earth-scale” virtual world, Artemis is set to offer a living, breathing ecosystem where players can interact with an expansive environment that mirrors the complexity and diversity of our planet.

Greene’s vision for Artemis includes the use of cutting-edge procedural generation technology, developed in-house by his studio. The game will leverage this technology to create diverse biomes, weather patterns, and ecosystems that evolve and react to player actions. This ambitious project aims to blend the boundaries between reality and virtual worlds, offering an unparalleled immersive experience.

Preface: A Glimpse into the Future

To showcase the technological advancements that will power both Prologue and Artemis, Greene’s studio has released a free tech demo called Preface: Undiscovered World. Available now, Preface allows players to explore a massive, procedurally generated planet with varied biomes and interactive systems.

Preface is designed to provide a hands-on experience with the new Melba engine, the proprietary technology developed by Greene’s team. Players can navigate through different terrains, weather conditions, and ecosystems, experiencing the potential of what Artemis will eventually offer. This demo serves as both a technical showcase and a tool for gathering player feedback to refine and enhance the final products.

Community Engagement and Future Plans

Brendan Greene emphasized the importance of community feedback in shaping the development of these projects. By releasing Preface, Greene hopes to engage with players and collect valuable insights that will inform the ongoing development of Prologue and Artemis.

As the gaming world eagerly anticipates the full release of these groundbreaking titles, Greene and his team remain committed to pushing the limits of procedural generation and creating truly immersive virtual worlds. The journey from Prologue to Artemis promises to be an exciting and innovative exploration of what the future of gaming can hold.

Business, Gaming, News

EA Expands Accessibility Patents Pledge with 23 New Patents

Electronic Arts (EA) has expanded its Accessibility Patents Pledge by adding 23 new patents to the initiative. Launched in August 2021, the pledge initially included five patents aimed at improving accessibility for players. Over the years, this number has grown to 15, and now, with the latest addition, the total stands at 38 patents.

These patents cover a range of technologies designed to make gaming more inclusive for players with disabilities or medical issues. Some of the newly added patents include:

  • Intelligent Personalized Speech Recognition: A system that improves the accuracy and efficiency of speech recognition by using personal phoneme mappings for each user.
  • Generating Expressive Speech Audio from Text Data: A system that generates expressive speech audio from text data, providing more control and personalization based on desired speaking style and speaker attributes.
  • Generating Speech in the Voice of a Player: A system that can generate speech in the voice of a player for their avatar, based on minimal sample speech data.
  • Voice Aging Using Machine Learning: A system that can age an original input voice to a desired target age without requiring additional voice samples.
  • Emotion-Based Music Style Change Using Deep Learning: A system that infers a player’s emotion while playing a video game and tunes the background soundtrack to best fit that emotion.

In addition to the patents, EA has also released an Unreal Engine 5 plugin that enables in-engine use of its photosensitivity analysis tech, IRIS, which was open-sourced last year. This plugin allows developers to analyze and identify frames that could potentially impact players who experience photosensitivity and make necessary adjustments.

EA’s commitment to making games more accessible is evident in its ongoing efforts to share its accessibility-centered technology with the wider industry royalty-free. By doing so, EA aims to encourage the industry to work together to remove barriers and make gaming more inclusive for everyone.

Breaking, Business, Games, Gaming, News, PC

But of course, Amazon is promoting Secret Level TV Series with FREE games

Amazon Prime Gaming is celebrating the upcoming release of its animated show, Secret Level, by offering an additional 10 free games to subscribers. This surprise announcement comes as Prime Gaming gears up for the December 10 release of the show, which tells short stories set within the world of popular video games.

Prime Gaming subscribers can now claim these new titles, which include a mix of classic and modern games spread across different PC gaming platforms. Some of the games will be available for free into 2025, giving players plenty of time to enjoy them.

The free games lineup includes:

  • Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition (GOG)
  • Baldur’s Gate II: Enhanced Edition (GOG)
  • Necromunda: Hired Gun (Epic Games Store)
  • Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition (GOG)
  • The Outer Worlds (GOG)
  • Space Hulk: Deathwing – Enhanced Edition (Amazon Games)
  • Spelunky (GOG)
  • Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War (Amazon Games)
  • Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine (Amazon Games)
  • Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II (Amazon Games, coming December 12)

Prime Gaming has already announced 18 free games for December 2024, and this latest batch of 10 new titles adds to the excitement. Subscribers can claim these games by connecting their Amazon and Twitch accounts, making it easy to access and enjoy the free content.

This offer is a great way for Prime members to build hype for the Secret Level series by exploring the games that inspired it.

Don’t miss out on this opportunity to add some fantastic titles to your gaming library for free!

Games, Gaming, News

Not exactly EOL but Foamstarts will be on barebone in 2025

Square Enix has announced that the next season of Foamstars, titled “Party Goes On!”, will be the game’s last. Starting on December 13, 2024, and running until January 17, 2025, this final season will mark the end of seasonal updates for the game. However, Foamstars will remain online and playable, with all online services continuing to be available.

After the final season, Square Enix plans to introduce expansions to enhance gameplay, including customizable shots for characters and new enhancement elements like Prism Gems. The Foamstars Cup, a series of in-game events named after each character, will also be held to keep the community engaged.

Despite the end of seasonal updates, previous Season Passes will be made available again, allowing players to obtain items they might have missed. This decision comes after Foamstars transitioned to a free-to-play model in October 2024, following its initial launch as a PlayStation Plus title in February 2024.

Season Updates

As previously announced, season updates for FOAMSTARS will end on December 13. There will be no new content added beyond this date, but the various online services will remain available.

Even after the “PARTY GOES ON!” season concludes on January 17 next year, the FOAMSTARS CUP will begin as in-game events named after each character. In addition, EXTREME PARTY will also take place regularly.

The CASUAL PARTY and MISSION mode, etc. can be enjoyed as before, and previous Season Passes will be made available again as well.

To our players

Thank you so much for playing FOAMSTARS.

I don’t want this to sound like a final message since you will be able to continue playing the game. However I wanted to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to you all once again, so I’ve taken up my pen to write this producer’s letter.

From the start, alongside Director Rickey, FOAMSTARS had been developed with the goal of creating “a game that everyone can enjoy together.”

“Everyone together” doesn’t just refer to the players, but also includes their family members and partners who may be watching them play, and those who are watching and engaging through streams.

Since the game’s release on February 6, 2024, the development team has been working tirelessly to add new content and features, striving to bring the game as close as possible to that goal.

Throughout both the development and operational phases, we have faced many challenges. However, the support of all of you who play the game, along with the incredible fan art, has been a constant source of encouragement for the team. It’s because of this support that we’ve been able to overcome these difficulties, always with the goal of responding to your feedback.

If FOAMSTARS has become a game that you can enjoy with others, then we couldn’t be happier.

Thanks to all of you, we’ve managed to successfully complete every update we had planned. We’ve been able to reach this point because of your warm support. On behalf of the entire team, I’d like to take this opportunity to express our heartfelt gratitude.

And finally…

Again, the various online services for FOAMSTARS will continue to be available for your enjoyment. The party at Bath Vegas will carry on, thanks to the FOAMSTARS cast and, most of all, to you – the players!

We hope you will continue to enjoy FOAMSTARS for many years to come.

Thank you for your continued support.

Kosuke Okatani (FOAMSTARS Producer)

While the end of seasonal updates may be disappointing for some fans, Square Enix’s commitment to keeping the game online and introducing new gameplay enhancements shows their dedication to the Foamstars community.