THE ULTIMATE TRACKMANIA VERSION AVAILABLE IN RETAIL IN MAY 2008

TrackMania United Forever, the next edition in the award-winning TrackMania series, will be released on May 23^rd. Featuring more tracks than ever before, TrackMania United Forever is the only way to get the complete TrackMania experience.

More cars!

· Stadium Car – Iconic TrackMania car that’s part F1 car, part sturdy buggy

· Fast racing Car – The fastest car in the TrackMania series will test your reaction times

· The ‘American’ - Sensitive suspension to challenge handling skills

· 4×4 Grand Class – Fast and flexible with a motor revved to the max

· Rally Car – Slide round dirt tracks with this ultra light and ultra powerful vehicle

· Roadster - Requires meticulous driving with expert acceleration and breaking

· Pick-Up - Rough and tumble racing with a mechanical monster

More environments!

· Stadium - Spectacular environments for high-speed races & rally style skidding

· Island - Astounding loops and gigantic jump ramps with paradise as the backdrop

· Desert - Chain bridges and giant potholes across wide plains and stony canyons

· Bay - An urban environment with tracks like ‘car skate-parks’

· Rally - Dirt paths, asphalt roads, medieval walls, rivers and winding, hilly tracks

· Coast - Narrow roads with cliffs and jumps in a Mediterranean setting

· Snow - Snow or ice covered roads in a mountainous region

More than a game!

Join the TrackMania community and race millions of opponents worldwide. Share player-created tracks and showcase customised cars. It is only with TrackMania United Forever that all track environments and car types are available to compete with.

Fast facts:

Publisher: Ascaron Entertainment / 93Games

Web: www.Ascaron.com / www.trackmania.com
Developer: Nadeo
Release date: May 23^rd
PEGI: 3+
Format: PC
Genre: Racing

Wednesday 21st May/Brighton, UK… NCsoft® Europe, the world’s leading developer and publisher of online computer games, today announced the release of City of Heroes® “Issue 12: Midnight Hour.” The newest free expansion for current subscribers, Issue 12 brings to life a special covert group from the game’s lore, highly-anticipated Villain Epic Archetypes, more powerset options and character slots for players, plus a whole new Greek- and Roman-inspired zone to explore!

City of Heroes Issue 12, developed and published by NCsoft, brings the Midnight Squad out of the lore and into the game. The Midnight Squad is the clandestine organization of mystics, scholars and mages who hold a secret that could bring the alien group, the Rikti, to its knees. Players are encouraged to help the Midnight Squad uncover the secret that could help save Paragon City™ and the Rogue Isles from further alien assaults.

Part of this secret will be revealed in a new zone called Cimerora, which uses the Ouroboros time travel system introduced in Issue 11. This zone, inspired by ancient Greece and Rome, is only accessible by working with the Midnight Squad. Once the player has access, both villains and heroes must face deadly creatures and defeat an unexpected threat. As a reward for their accomplishments in Cimerora, players can unlock special Greek- and Roman-inspired armor and costumes.

Another key feature in Issue 12 is Villain Epic Archetypes. Now, villains who reach level 50 unlock two brand new epic archetypes; Wolf Spiders and Blood Widows. Wolf Spiders can specialize into Bane Spiders or Crab Spiders, and Blood Widows can develop into Night Widows or Fortunatas. Each specialty enjoys a unique set of wickedly powerful attacks.

Issue 12 also introduces Powerset Proliferation (http://eu.cityofheroes.com/game-guide/feature-updates/powerset_proliferation_powersets_revealed), which vastly increases the variety of villain and hero characters that players can create. Some powersets, previously only available to hero archetypes, are now available to designated villain archetypes, and vice versa. To help accommodate all of these new character options, the development team has opened additional character slots. All current subscribers receive two new character slots for use on the server of their choice. Other slots may be acquired as a part of the Veteran Rewards (http://eu.cityofheroes.com/game-guide/veteran-rewards/) program, or for purchase. Details can be found on the City of Heroes web site (http://eu.cityofheroes.com/news/article/3165/).

“With the introduction of Villain Epic Archetypes, new costume options and Powerset Proliferation in Issue 12, we knew players would want to be able to create new characters,” said Matt Miller, lead designer. “Expanding the number of character slots in this way ensures that our players can use all these new features. We think it’s a great solution that adds value to the service.”

To join the adventures of the most successful comic-book themed game on the market, players can purchase the City of Heroes “Good Versus Evil Edition” game pack at retailers across Europe or through digital download via http://eu.plaync.com/eu/store/, which includes complete City of Heroes and City of Villains® games, as well as a set of exclusive bonus items. Customers receive the first month of play free and both games can be played for the single monthly subscription price of £8.99 / €12.99.

For more information about City of Heroes, go to http://www.eu.cityofheroes.com/.

CLASSIC 1978 SELF-TITLED DEBUT ALBUM

Harmonix and MTV Games announced today their second complete album addition to the Rock Band downloadable content catalog: The Cars’ 1978 self-titled debut, which will be available Tuesday, May 27.

Hailed by Rolling Stone as one of the 500 greatest albums of all time, The Cars was released 30 years ago this month by Elektra Records and spawned new wave classic hits such as “Good Times Roll,” “My Best Friend’s Girl,” “Just What I Needed,” “You’re All I’ve Got Tonight” and pop-culture’s favorite bikini-top-removing theme song “Moving in Stereo.”

Each track will be available for $1.99 per track (160 Microsoft Points for Xbox 360) or $14.99 (1200 Microsoft Points for Xbox 360) for the album.

Release date: Tuesday, May 27, 2008 (Xbox LIVE® Marketplace)

Thursday, May 29, 2008 (PLAYSTATION®Store)

Tracks: The Cars The Cars album
“Good Times Roll”
“My Best Friend’s Girl”
“Just What I Needed”
“I’m in Touch with Your World”
“Don’t Cha Stop”
“You’re All I’ve Got Tonight”
“Bye Bye Love”
“Moving in Stereo”
“All Mixed Up”

(All nine tracks utilize the original master recordings)

Price: $14.99 (1200 Microsoft Points for Xbox 360) for the Album
or

$1.99 (160 Microsoft Points for Xbox 360) per track

Locations: Xbox LIVE Marketplace and PLAYSTATION®Network

** Dates for Rock Band game tracks are tentative and subject to change **

With the addition of these tracks there are now more than 170 tracks available to date via disc and download purchase. The complete list of tracks available to date can are located at http://www.rockband.com/dlc. Rock Band continues to fly off shelves and satisfy music fans and gamers’ voracious appetite for rock as more than 10 million downloads have been purchased since its launch on November 20, 2007. The Rock Band Music Store allows players to preview and purchase downloadable individual music tracks and packs from the vast selection of offerings available to date without ever leaving the game as they build their own custom Rock Band library.

Rock Band allows online play and features that expand the boundaries of music gaming. Rock Band downloadable content is playable and integrated into setlists in all game modes including: Solo Tour, Band World Tour, head-to-head competition either locally or online, and from any Quickplay mode. In order to play downloadable content for head-to-head matches or multiplayer online, all players must own the same downloadable track. Downloadable content for the Xbox®360 video game and entertainment system from Microsoft will be available for purchase via Xbox LIVE Marketplace using Microsoft Points and is downloaded directly to the Xbox 360 hard drive. Downloadable content for the PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system’s version of Rock Band will be available for purchase on the PLAYSTATION®Store through the free PLAYSTATION Network and is downloaded directly to PLAYSTATION
3 system’s built in hard drive.

Rock Band is rated “T” for Teen (lyrics, mild suggestive themes) by the ESRB.

NCsoft reveals two developer diaries highlighting the latest development updates to the highly acclaimed, Richard Garriott’s Tabula Rasa. These insights focus on the reconstruction of the Magma Caverns with its brand new map layout and entirely new missions. Lead World Designer, Michael Hutchison looks into the physical design changes within the game from a world-building perspective, while Mission Designer, Jason Ford views the same instance from the game mechanics point of view.

Jason Ford, Mission Designer:
We’re working hard to add brand new maps and missions to Tabula Rasa, but we are also taking the time to polish and add exciting new content to our existing maps and missions as well. The re-work we’ve done for Magma Caverns is a little bit of both of these things combined, so we thought it might be interesting to talk about the revamping of Magma Caverns.

For several reasons, we decided to completely re-do the level design and create brand new missions for Magma Caverns. The current live version will be replaced in the Deployment 8 update with this newly redesigned version. While the ideas in the original were good, we felt that the implementation was not realizing its own potential.

First, a little bit of background. Magma Caverns is currently built for players around level 45, and the level of the instance will remain the same in the reworked version (level 44 – 46). You can access the instance by traveling to the Western edge of Torden Abyss on Planet Arieki. Both the original instance and the new version are based on an ethical parable where the players are given a choice that affects the mission line and story progression for the rest of the map. Initially, the players were instructed to enter Magma Caverns to find a renegade science team and bring them back for court martial, or execute them if they resist. The player was then given the choice to either fight or help them. When we redesigned the map, we ripped out all of the old missions and designed entirely new missions from scratch, including a brand new type of choice mission for groups. As a result, the new storyline is differs slightly from the original.

Magma Caverns was originally designed in such a way that players were unable to play through a large portion of the instance, because only certain areas of the map were available depending on the choice players made near the beginning of the map. For example, the spawning of creatures in the map was dependent upon the choice players made in the choice mission previously mentioned. If a player skipped this part of the mission for any reason, there wouldn’t be anything for players to fight against. Also, since the choice mission wasn’t repeatable players couldn’t try the other choice, and there would be nothing left for players to do if they chose to revisit the map after completing it the first time. Lastly, if a group of players went into Magma Caverns together, the choice in this mission would be decided by the first player to make a decision, regardless of the opinions of his/her group. All in all, we felt that there were fundamental issues in both the mission and level design that needed to be addressed.

Our solution to this problem involved keeping a lot of the original ideas behind the design of Magma Caverns. For instance, we really liked the idea of having a choice mission at the beginning of the map that resulted in playing the map in one of two different ways. In rethinking Magma Caverns and choice missions, one of our designers, Berenger Fish, came up with a brand new way to script together a choice mission in Tabula Rasa. It allows members of a group to vote for a choice in this mission and reach a decision for the group based on the majority vote (solo play is also available). The result was a choice mission appropriately titled “Consensus.” Like the original choice mission, “Consensus” gives players a choice to side with either the Rebels or the Penumbra , the two warring factions in this map.

We also added two new factions created specifically for the missions in Magma Caverns. With the redesign, players can join either the Rebel or the Penumbra faction. Rather than spawning the map with either Rebel or Penumbra as a result of players’ choices, we spawned the map with both, and players’ factions are changed according to their choice or their group’s choice during the “Consensus” mission. With the new faction system in play on Magma Caverns, the Rebels and Penumbra are either hostile or friendly to players, and always against each other. This way we could create a real battle that players could choose which side to support.

If players choose to side with the imbedded Rebels, they will defend against Penumbra assaults and eventually take part in an attack on the Penumbra’s landing zone. On the other hand, if they side with Penumbra, players will participate in the assaults against the Rebels, eventually attempting to take over the Rebel Camp and run the Rebels out of Magma Caverns.

Regardless of which side of the battle players are on, they will have the option to call in reinforcements to help them in the battle if it gets tough. Also, special Penumbra or Rebel waypoints and hospitals will become available to players depending on which side they choose. There are even bonus objectives in the missions for both Rebels and Penumbra. Players will have the opportunity to earn extra experience points and credits depending upon how well they defend certain key points in the map for both factions.

Since “Consensus” is a repeatable mission, players will be able to re-visit Magma Caverns any time they please. They can return at a later time to side with the faction they didn’t go with before and experience the other half of the missions for this map. There is also a side mission to defeat a giant Magmonix that’s hostile to both factions known as “Ember.” Players can experience this mission regardless of the side they choose.

We hope players enjoy the brand new look and feel in Magma Caverns, and we’re working hard every day to bring them exciting and new experiences in Tabula Rasa. Hopefully the work we’ve done in Magma Caverns will be seen as a good example of what players can expect to see as we continue to grow and enhance Tabula Rasa altogether.

Michael Hutchison, Lead World Designer:
The rework of Magma Caverns was undertaken as part of our team’s efforts to make each area of the game as consistent as possible with the other areas of the game. We’re always looking at ways to make the players’ entire experience in Tabula Rasa feel as polished as possible, and to improve upon areas that might not hold up as well as others. With Magma Caverns, we felt we had a really great opportunity to make dramatic improvements to map flow, mission design, visual interest, and overall quality of presentation. I am here to talk about my perspective on what Magma Caverns was and what it will be, with Deployment 8, coming up soon.

As we considered the area more, we got excited by some new ideas, and the prospects of making some notable improvements to the map and its missions for the players. We were motivated by a few main concerns, which guided our criteria for the re-work. Among them: that the instance should offer more level-appropriate content, that it should have a tone in keeping with the storyline, that its conclusion should be more satisfying, and that the visual points of interest should be highlighted in more dramatic ways.

The layout of the previous version of Magma Caverns didn’t allow for a direct flow through the space, in keeping with the sequence of events in the missions. In fact, it was even possible to miss entire sections of the map depending on the path you took within the instance. So, the map just wasn’t being fully utilized. Of course, changing this was important so that no player would feel cheated out of content and visuals. Plus, as developers, we just want to make sure players get to see all of the things that we spend so much time creating! All of this prompted us to look at how the map was built from the ground up, and identify ways to drive players to each area of the map regardless of the choices they made, while also eliminating any backtracking. Essentially, we ended up giving Magma Caverns a complete overhaul.

In looking at the world design of the previous map, there were areas that I thought were very well done, some areas that I felt had greater potential, and some locations we felt needed to be added in order to support the story and backdrop of Torden Abyss. We added a new location called the “Arkhara Research Station,” which is an abandoned Brann research station that monitored the seismic and volcanic forces at the nearby “Agni’s Cauldron” caldera. We placed this new location at the entrance to the map, and it is there that the player will make the choice of whether to align himself with Penumbra or the Rebels. This choice will lead to one of two locations beyond: via teleporter to the Rebel Camp, or through an adjacent cavern to the Agni’s Cauldron point of interest. Either choice will send the player on a mission chain which will lead them on a path through the entirety of the Magma Caverns instance.

Agni’s Cauldron is one area that was left virtually unchanged from the previous version of Magma Caverns, although players will now enter it from a new location which makes a stronger first impression. Agni’s Cauldron was a cool and unique area already; I simply added additional polish through some new visual effects and lighting, and tuned the sky a bit to make it feel like it is part of a much bigger environment above.

In a remote corner of the previous map, there was a small, but well done location where some raintree seeds had been able to take root via some small holes in the cavern ceiling. This small grotto provided a contrasting glimpse of life in an otherwise hostile underground. I really liked this concept and wanted to expand it into a full blown point of interest and make it into one of the signature locations of Magma Caverns. And so was born the “Sakra Oasis,” where a caved-in cavern ceiling has allowed a grove of raintrees to enter from above. This creates a parallel to the Ruins of Tampeii area on the Torden Abyss shared map, where the same thing can be seen happening; so this was a nice way to tie the instance in with what the player already knows about the environment surrounding Abyss.

Another place where I took a previous idea and expanded on it is at the Magmonix Grounds, where a Magmonix graveyard is caught in the middle of the struggle between the Rebels and Penumbra. The original map had a small cave, somewhat off the main path, which had some Magmonix remains tucked away inside. Again, I liked this concept and wanted to expand it into a larger, more unique, and fully realized location. So, I created a cave section off of the Magmonix Grounds to create the graveyard. Adding this location served a few purposes. First, it provided an area with more level ground, which, due to their size, works better for these creatures’ movements. It also makes engaging in combat with them easier, since the player has more space in which to move around. Having Magmonix in the map is important because they add more indigenous life to the Magma Caverns, therefore helping to present a more complete ecosystem. Lastly, just having the location there tells a story about Magmonix, how and where they live, and what they do when they die. It’s a small way to enrich the fictional backdrop of the game and its settings.

All in all, we’re very satisfied by the work we did to improve this instance, and hope that those players who have seen the previous version will agree. For those who have not yet seen the Magma Caverns, I hope they’ll find its visuals unique, and its replay-ability exciting.

NCsoft’s Senior Art Lead, Ken Morse gives an insight into the process that took the Cimerora area, inspired by Greece and Rome, from concept through to completion for the forthcoming release of Issue 12: Midnight Hour for City of Heroes/City of Villains.

As the Senior Art Lead, it’s my job to figure out how to turn Positron and the rest of the team’s ideas into visual realities. Coming from both a film and environment art background, I am always excited when the opportunity to create new settings for the game presents itself. A Task Force inspired by ancient Greece and Rome, however, was genre-stretching territory we’d never ventured into before, and presented some serious challenges.

Could Heroes and Villains of every imaginable variety fit into an ancient, fantastic setting? Would Cimerora feel as connected to the Hero and Villain experience as Atlas Park or Mercy Island? Would it be exciting to see super powered battles between leather and bronze clad warriors in sandals versus Heroes and Villains in tights? I’d like to give you a glimpse into the process that took Cimerora from concept to completion!

Creating Cimerora: The Process

1 – Genesis of the Idea
Creating Greek and Roman inspired mission content was something that we wanted to do with Issue 11: A Stitch in Time. It was always a goal of ours for that Issue to really make you feel like a time traveler by going back to ancient times and interacting with the locals there. Unfortunately, when all the art tasks for Issue 11 were estimated, it became apparent that we would not be able to complete it for that Issue. We did, however, start work on several assets that we knew we would need once we got the content underway.

2 – Mission/Zone Concept

For Issue 12, Positron (Matt Miller) and Hero 1 (Joe Morrissey) had a time traveling Task Force in mind with several fairly epic missions. It quickly became clear that in order to truly support the Task Force content, Cimerora would need to become a place of its own.

Taking Heroes and Villains to ancient times was a huge challenge conceptually and visually, and we felt that providing a persistent area for players to explore, team up in, and even resurrect if needed, would help make the experience feel more natural.

Another key conceptual goal for Cimerora was to make it feel like a real place, rather than just a play space. To make this a reality, we decided that all mission and zone content should be interconnected, forming a more continuous geographical area for players to explore.

3 – Asset Concept and Creation
While Hero 1 retreated to his cave to design the mission and story content of the zone, I drew up a rough map of the spaces we’d need and the environment artists began gathering reference and prototyping assets for the zone.

For signature architecture and locations we turned to our fantastic concept artist, Carolina Tello Alvarado, who illustrated all of the key architecture and iconography for Castellum Quarter and the Oracle’s Island . These illustrations, along with the advance work we did during Issue 11, helped the environment team work quickly and effectively to create and refine literally thousands of new visual assets encompassing everything from cliffs and terrain to buildings and fortresses.

4 – Environment Layout and Prototyping

Once the library of Cimeroran assets had begun to take shape, Don Pham and Ryan Roth of our environment team worked closely with Hero 1 and War Witch (Melissa Bianco) to create the map layouts you’ll find in Cimerora. Reveals and vistas were carefully planned and “white boxed” in order to ensure that the story was revealed visually as intended. “White boxing” is the process of using an easily changeable, temporary layout to make sure game play, “pathing” and overall flow is working properly.

5 – Revision

White boxed zones often change daily based on play testing, story modifications; or simply because some ideas sound great on paper, but don’t work so well in game. This was the case with the Castellum Quarter mission map for the Time’s Arrow Task Force. The original design of Castellum Quarter called for a high class temple district with beautiful gardens, but when the environments were created in the editor, it became apparent that the mood just wasn’t sinister and epic enough to sell the story content. The white boxed level was torn down, and a new Castellum Quarter was born as a huge fortress atop craggy cliffs , connected by soaring bridges.

6 - Population, Revision and More Revision
As the Art and Design teams reached consensus on the layouts for Cimerora and its associated missions, War Witch began drawing on the fantastic Greek and Roman inspired characters and costumes Jay Doherty created as well as the spectacular new animations and FX that Back Alley Brawler (Chris Bruce) and the animation team supplied to populate each map with dynamic spawns and NPCs.

Shortly after the maps were populated and missions were hooked up, it was time for play testing, and inevitably, more revisions!

7- Polish and Release
During the final days before release, feedback from internal play tests as well as from closed and open beta testing is examined. Game play is tweaked, geometry holes are plugged, and textures, scene settings, music and audio are all finalized for release. By the time you set foot in Cimerora, its final content will have been contributed to by almost every member of the Art and Design teams.

Final Words
Cimerora is one of my favorite places in the CoH/CoV universe, and is a truly unique zone that has allowed us to push the game’s visuals and level design in new, more focused and immersive directions. I hope Heroes and Villains alike find their travels in Cimerora to be as exciting and memorable as it has been for the team to create this new zone!