The post Edge magazine goes inside Valve Software for an exclusive 34-page feature covering Half-Life: Alyx, Steam and more appeared first on Game News.
]]>- You can pre-order your copy of Edge Magazine’s Valve special edition (opens in new tab) for delivery to your door. Hurry, while stocks last.
In Edge 344, we review Half-Life: Alyx (opens in new tab), and tell the fascinating story of the game’s creation. But to focus solely on Half-Life is to ignore everything else Valve represents. Originally merely a brilliant game developer, the Valve of today is also shopkeeper of the industry’s biggest download store, owner of some of the most popular games on the planet, and has moved from software to services into hardware, making the most powerful VR headset available.
As such this isn’t merely an issue about Half-Life: Alyx. It’s also a chance to check in on one of the most secretive companies in the industry, to talk not only about its new VR game but also the headset around which it is built, the platform through which it will be sold, and the games and initiatives whose success have helped fund it. And yes, to get Gabe Newell on tape, because it’s been far too long.
Edge 344 goes on sale in print on Thursday, March 26 through all major newsagents, featuring this beautiful wraparound cover, custom-designed for us by Valve’s artists:
Subscriber copies will begin arriving in the coming days, and feature an exclusive cover design we’re not revealing yet, in order to preserve the surprise for our subscribers. To guarantee delivery of future issues, check the latest Edge magazine subscription offers (opens in new tab).
We’re mindful that many readers, and potential readers, are stuck at home and unable to head to the shops to get their issue. As such, for the first time – of many, we hope – we’re offering a limited number of pre-orders of our print edition through our online store.
Get five issues of Edge for only £5 / $5
We’re also launching our digital edition earlier than the planned street date of March 26; it’ll be live at 5pm GMT next Monday, March 23. Our latest subscriber offer gets you your first five digital issues for just £5/ $5 (opens in new tab) – and if you sign up now, your subscription will begin with our Valve special edition.
Here’s a glimpse at what else awaits inside.
Valve Time
With a photographer in tow, we conducted more than 20 interviews with Valve staff in a bid to paint a picture of where the company stands in 2020. We tell the story of how Half-Life: Alyx was made, then look into the past, present, and future of everything else that defines this remarkable studio: from games such as Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Dota Underlords, and Artifact – yes, it has a future – to its plans for Steam and its hardware business.
An Audience With… Gabe Newell
What happens when you sit down for an hour with one of the industry’s finest, and most forward-thinking minds? Quite a lot, as it happens, from how we’ll be controlling games with our brains – and vice versa – within the next few years, to how single-player games will soon be powered by virtual people that live in our computers. In rare, wide-ranging conversation, Newell reflects on the milestone moments that have taken Valve to where it is today, and offers some tantalising hints at where it’s headed next.
Half-Life: Alyx reviewed
Valve is one of only a handful of development studios to have multiple Edge 10s under its belt. Can a game built from the ground up around a proprietary VR headset deliver the studio its third? Our review investigates, and in our Post Script we examine whether Alyx is the proof of concept for consumer VR in general.
Subscribe today
For more industry-beating access to the very best that the videogame industry has to offer, why not subscribe to Edge? You’ll save on the cover price and have your copy delivered to your door (or device) each month, complete with exclusive subscriber covers.
You can subscribe to the print edition (opens in new tab), digital version (opens in new tab), or save even more with the print/digital bundle (opens in new tab) – whatever you choose, you can rest easy in the knowledge you’re getting the full story before anyone else.
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]]>The post The Netherlands declares four games using loot boxes to be in violation of law appeared first on Game News.
]]>Not so fast.
While it’s true that The Netherlands found 4 of 10 games it investigated to be in violation of the law, this isn’t quite the Earth-shaking moment it may at first appear to be. Let us explain:
This wasn’t a scientific study
The Netherlands began its investigation in November 2017, focusing on 10 games with loot boxes deemed to be the most popular. The exact methodology has not been revealed, but the Netherlands Gaming Authority claims in its initial news post that it more or less just pulled the 10 most popular games with loot boxes off an unnamed streaming site (I’m betting Twitch, but that’s just speculation on my part). It then used a tool to evaluate how random the rewards were, and made decisions based on previously-penned literature on gambling and addiction.
In other words, there doesn’t appear to have been rigorous testing, accounting for variables, or a control group like you would see in a scientific study – and that makes sense, because it was never supposed to be about that. This was not an effort to determine what effect loot boxes have on the brain, it was a government inquiry to see who, if anyone, was breaking the law. Be wary of anyone saying this proves something beyond “four games violated the law.” Speaking of law…
These are not new laws
The Netherlands did not just make loot boxes illegal. It did not write new laws in the wake of fiascos like Star Wars Battlefront 2 or Middle-earth: Shadow of War. Instead, this investigation sought to determine if current video games were in violation of existing laws.
And, as the post itself declares (via Google Translate), “Coincidence determines the contents of these loot boxes. Moreover, the prizes can be traded outside the game: the prizes have economic value. It is forbidden to offer this type of games of chance without a license to the Dutch players.”
In other words, any game of chance with economic value (which the investigation determined several loot boxes to be) require a license, and it’s that lack of license that the NGA takes issue with. These laws are already on the books. All the loot box controversy did was bring light to the practice – it didn’t cause new laws about what is and isn’t legal.
This does not apply to all loot boxes
You may be wondering why only 4 out of 10 games investigated were found to be in violation of established law. Re-read the quote above; did you catch the bit about “economic value”? If the items contained within a game’s loot box could be traded or sold outside of the game, that made them worth real-world money.
And according to the NGA, if you can sink real-world money into a game of chance and receive something worth real-world money in exchange (even if by default it is still a virtual item), that’s gambling. And that requires a license.
So, games like Overwatch, which helped popularize the business model, would be exempt because nothing from an Overwatch loot box can be traded or sold outside of the game. However, since you can sell Dota 2’s items via the Steam Marketplace, it could be in violation. Unfortunately…
We don’t know who got in trouble
The NGA’s report merely states that 4 of the investigated 10 games were found to be in violation of the law. No names, of either the games themselves or the developers and publishers, were released. Dutch website NOS (opens in new tab) singles out FIFA 18, Dota 2, PUBG, and Rocket League, but it’s not clear if these are the confirmed culprits or merely suspects (translation via Reddit (opens in new tab)).
That said, the NGA said that the 10 games it investigated were pulled from a popular streaming platform, so one need only look at the trending games on services like Twitch to get an idea of whose wrists are getting the proverbial slap. Again, these aren’t the confirmed four games mentioned by the report, but they fit the description.
The repercussions will be minor (for now)
Whoever is behind the four unnamed games found to be in violation of The Netherlands’ gambling laws will have until June 20 to adjust their designs. If they do not, the government can impose fines or prohibit sales of the game.
The NGA also claimed that it found a potential link between loot boxes and addiction. Therefore, it requests that developers and publishers (even those not in violation of the law) remove “addiction-sensitive elements (‘near-profit’ effects, visual effects, the possibility to keep open loot boxes in quick succession and the like)”. While The Netherlands is not enforcing these requests via law, it nonetheless sends a message.
You might think this would be a final nail in the coffin for loot boxes then, because now a government body has basically said ‘this is gambling, and we’re going to regulate it like gambling’ (and indeed this could be a major precedent that other countries look to as they also figure out what to do about loot boxes). But there’s some vindication for publishers looking to the monetization system too.
Remember, only games with loot boxes containing items that could be sold or traded for real-world money were found to be in violation of the law. So loot boxes themselves aren’t actually in any major trouble, just a very specific type are.
That all being said, loot boxes are such a divisive topic that publishers have started shying away from the practice, if not removing them all together a la Battlefront 2 (opens in new tab) and Shadow of War (opens in new tab). So it’s possible this will be the nudge that convinces publishers and developers to give up on loot boxes, or it could just be a warning shot. Time will tell.
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]]>The post Watch Dota 2 in action for the first time via tournament replays right now appeared first on Game News.
]]>The matches began yesterday, when the sixteen teams were split into four groups to play preliminary matches and be ranked. Teams that performed well were put into the winners bracket and the losers were shamefully tossed into the losers bracket. Teams that lose a match while in the winners bracket drop into the losers bracket, and anyone that loses a match in the losers bracket is out of the competition. The last teams standing will meet on Sunday for the final match. The biggest thing at steak is pride, but the winners will also receive a million dollars (opens in new tab).
The tournament is also serving as the public unveiling of Dota 2. Though this is our first look, the game is expected to launch either late this year or early in 2012. If you’d like a chance to try it out before then, the beta signup is open (opens in new tab), and Valve has said that testing should being a few short weeks after the tournament ends.
Aug 18, 2011
Source:Dota2.com (opens in new tab)
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]]>The post Dota 2 trailer is as action-packed as it is confusing appeared first on Game News.
]]>In keeping with the theme of Dota 2’s marketing campaign – whose key message seems to be, “if you love Dota, you’ll love this, and if you don’t know what Dota is, screw you” – the title got an official trailer to coincide with the game’s impending public reveal at the Gamescom-based International tournament. Fan of the original? You’ll thrill to this clip’s Michael Bay-style dramatization of the game’s strategy action. Still waiting to find out what all the fuss is about? Here’s an advert for a fantasy game where you can pick a fast Elf or a strong Barbarian.
Above: Images surfaced this weekend of what purports to be the game itself. For the purposes of this article, let’s say they look pretty legit
We’ve been following Dota 2 since its original announcement (opens in new tab), and it’s great to see a fan-made project flourish under the direction of Valve – the studio has a proven record for noting and developing exceptional user-generated game content, and looks ready to do well again with this Warcraft 3 sequel/spinoff. However, if you’ve not been keeping tabs on this title – a continuation of an underground mod to a decade-old game, named for an acronym that doesn’t exist anymore and with a play style all its own – it’d be interesting to hear what you make of this trailer, whose glimpse of the game’s action and variety is tempered by a pretty generic sort of approach and makes it look more like a beat ’em up than the role-play strategy it is. Of course, it’s intended for a Gamescom audience, at which Dota 2 is a top-tier presence – but what do you, presumably not in attendance at the German convention, think?
Aug 15, 2011
The post Dota 2 trailer is as action-packed as it is confusing appeared first on Game News.
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