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Frictional Games, developer of the Penumbra survival horror series, has announced that work has begun on a new, currently untitled, horror game. The upcoming project is set in the late 18th century and will take the player on a thrill-ride through the depths of madness and explore the dark side of human emotions.

More about the upcoming title:

The primary aim is to make the game as scary and atmospheric as possible. "There are plenty of ideas that we never realized in the Penumbra games. We think it is possible to go a lot further in terms of evoking unsettling feelings and a sense of dread in the player", says co-founder and sound designer Jens Nilsson. The atmosphere is not the only focus of the game though and Frictional Games is determined to deliver a solid gameplay experience.

"We intend to give players a lot of freedom in our upcoming game", explains Thomas Grip, co-founder and lead programmer at Frictional Games. "Instead of following a laid out route we want players to choose for themselves how they want to progress and how deep they want explore various aspects of the game world".

Though the project will have a large focus on freedom, story will not be neglected. Frictional Games have been hard at work to develop a multitude of new ways to tell a story and yet allow for a dynamic gameplay. The goal is to make the story and gameplay converge and create a truly engaging and unique experience.

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Frictional Games

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The eleventh installment of Basilisk Games' Q&A series is now available and features another answer to fan questions about the upcoming Eschalon: Book II RPG. The latest comment reveals more information about the setting of the second game.

Question #11
[IJball] Will we visit Thaermore at all in Book II?
I know the "blurb" for Book II says "Thaermore has fallen." But I'm hoping we at least get to visit the area again (if not in Book II, then at least in Book III). I think I'll be sad if we never get to see Thaermore again...
The storyline for Book II does not involve Thaermore so we are not planning on reproducing that entire destroyed region within Book II. However, we are planning on taking players back to one small area inside Thaermore...
Perhaps for Book III we will reproduce all of the previous areas of Eschalon from Book I and II even if the storyline doesn't require it...we'll just have to see what our budget is for the 3rd game.

Basilisk Forum: Book II Setting

Basilisk Games

Eschalon: Book II

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More information about Diablo III, Blizzard Entertainment's return to the popular action RPG franchise, is now available. The latest round includes more comments from community manager Bashiok, new visual media, and a bestiary of the currently known monsters.

From GameBanshee:

On the logos:
Haha, well the icon right now is literally the Diablo-skull-sans-soulstone from (an existing) piece of art but I can almost guarantee it will change.

Some fun trivia about that piece though: That piece of artwork was originally created as a logo mock-up, a very long time ago, for Diablo III. The middle numeral was taken out and it was re-purposed as a piece for post-release Diablo II.

The More You Know!

Item grace period and the Alt key:
The way it works now is that when an item drops the name shows for about 5 seconds and then they fade out and disappear. Pressing Alt shows all dropped item names for again about 5 seconds and then the names fade out and disappear.

I actually didn't like it at first, I liked the on/off state of pressing or not pressing Alt, but with the names showing immediately after drop and having a sort of "grace period" after just tapping Alt, it's really grown on me and is a lot more intuitive. It's a lot easier to see what just dropped quickly and decide if you care, and it isn't necessary to constantly hold down Alt while scavenging after a large fight.

I still want to see -nopickup return but I haven't really asked anyone what the possibility of that is. I don't think it would work well with the current system, so options may have to be a possibility.

Each monster class has a set of types within it, the Dark Cultist class containing types such as the Dark Summoner and Dark Vessel. These different types have distinct statistics in terms of hit points, resistance levels, and special abilities. Additionally, each type is generally found in distinct areas of the game, later varieties naturally becoming better equipped to take down your hero or heroine.

As one might expect, Diablo III comes loaded with a large variety of demonic, undead, and animal-based foes serving the desires of evil. A number of these monster classes return from previous games in the series, while others act as spiritual successors; the Gnarled Walkers are an excellent example following in the root-steps of Thorned Hulks. Of course, the game is host to many new monsters like the Dune Thresher.

GameBanshee: Diablo III Forum Quotes

Blizzplanet: Item Grace Period & Alt Key

Planet Diablo: D3 Bestiary

Diablo III Screenshots

Diablo III Artwork

Blizzard Entertainment

Diablo III

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