So I was in Seattle this weekend and I decided to stop by the penny arcade expo this sunday and check things out. I got to play a ton of great games including Starcraft 2, Left 4 Dead, Demigod, Aeion, Warhammer Online, and Resistence 2. I got to meet Kevin Yu (Community Manager of Starcraft 2), Bashiok (Diablo 3 com manager), and I saw Adam Sessler on the street and shook his hand. I also met developers of Jumpgate, Dragonage Origins, and left 4 dead.
Information I picked up:
Vavle: (particularly interesting)
The developer told me some interesting things without telling me much. Portal 2 is going to be a sequel to portal but it is feeling so different that its hard to put a name on it. When I asked about the length of portal 2 he mentioned that he is unsure considering portal was originally going to be 50 minutes but it kept getting longer and longer. Episode 3 is in its early stages of development and they are still unsure about lots of things. When I asked if it would end the Gordon Freeman story arc he said they were unsure but he would guess no. I also asked about a new engine from Valve and he said that they continue to update their engines regularly for new games so that they are always looking better but they can just go off what works well for them.
When commenting on left 4 dead it was originally a 10 man project until valve got involved and did a complete reboot on the project.
Left 4 Dead Impressions:
Left 4 Dead is looking great in my opinion. People were screaming and laughing as mobs of zombies attacked the team. The physics look great and it is shaping up to be the game of 2008.
Blizzard:
As you already know, blizzard is extremely tight lipped. The information I could get from Bashiok is that Diablo 3's 1 act is mainly done but they are expecting to return to it and do a complete overhaul after act 5 is done because they always do their best work at the end of a project. He also confirmed that the game is going to be M for mature and extremely violent.
My conversation with Karune was mainly about my impressions of starcraft 2 and I basically just told him that if you are looking at the game from the outside and haven't played it, you will think it is just a graphics update of the first game but when you actually play it feels like a true evolution of starcraft. He agreed and said it was a real challenge displaying this to the forum guys who haven't played the game and then he had to go but I talked to his girlfriend for a little bit and she asked me if I was in his guild (lol).
Starcraft 2 Impressions:
Starcraft 2 is not even in beta and yet its level of polish and gameplay feel better than any rts I have recently played. When you played starcraft 2, your base honestly feels alive. The Zerg's creep looks like liquid ooze that is alive and their whole base just looks incredible. The protoss's base feels extremely high-tech and I definitely feel like I'm playing some high technology alien species. The terran were pretty cool aswell with their new art direction, they no longer look like toy soldiers.
Overall, the races felt great. I'm not a top tier player so the changes in the interfaces including MBS, automine, and unlimited select were nice but didn't take away from the extremely challenging nature of starcraft 2. This was my favorite game of the convention and I waited over 3.5 hours to play the demo 5 times.
Demigod:
The developer basically just showed me how to play (haha :P)..I didn't exactly understand the game at first and it seemed pretty bad but once I got up to speed I started enjoying it. The game is unlike any other I have played. Its setup reminded me more of a board game than a PC game since it had 3 narrow paths going to the enemy base and the base appeared to be completely out of place. That didn't distract me from having a fun time with the game though. The ranking up of the character and gaining new abilities was pretty interesting although I didn't have quite enough time to test all the talents. I look forward to playing in the beta and testing the game more in the coming months.
Jumpgate Evolution:
Jumpgate Evolution was extremely entertaining and unlike any MMO I have ever played. It was definitely a space simulator in the form of an MMO. The action was great, but I wasn't sure what my quest or purpose actually was. Although I'm pretty sure the build was just to show off combat, that was enough to impress me and I look forward to playing in the beta.
Bioware:
Dragonage Origins: So by the time I made it to the display "jail" where they were having the 35 minute demo sessions they were over for the day. Since I'm not a huge bioware fan I didn't really have any good questions to ask the guy but I had him fill me in on the game.
Warhammer Online:
The computer overheated right as I was getting on to try out the game and it would not start up. You would EA, you would. :P
That was all the information I picked up, hopefully you found some of it interesting. P.S. fallout 3's lines were too long to try the demo but the graphics looked great.
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