The 360 version isn’t as far behind the PS3 version as most people thought.

Apparently, to make up for the lack of user-generated content, Epic has thrown in a few exclusive bits to the Xbox 360 version of Unreal Tournament III. Oh, and the disc will also contain a sneak peek at Gears of War 2.

The 360 version will offer 5 new maps and 2 new characters not available in the PS3 release, as well as the aforementioned split-screen mode. But maybe you knew that already. What you probably didn’t know, however, is that Cliffy Blaznats will also offer some color commentary on an exclusive, as yet unseen video preview of the upcoming Gears of War 2.

Does this make up for the near infinite possibilities of user-generated content like that found on the PS3 version of UT3? Mark Rein, vice president of the world (and Epic Games), had this to say:

“This is a great title and, with two-player split screen support and some very cool new content, Xbox 360 players should be thrilled with this fantastic version of the game.”

I’ll be the judge of how thrilled I am about your game, thanks. UT3 is set to ship July 7th for the Xbox 360, with a review most likely to follow shortly thereafter.

Source

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been noticing quite a few themes that have been making their way through the industry. Throughout last week at GDC, many of these took center stage in a variety of forms. Today, we examine the state of PC Gaming.

Every year a multitude of publications come out proclaiming “PC gaming is dead! All units bail out!” It’s all getting to be a little ridiculous.

Now, let’s not be naive. PC gaming as we know it is in hot water and is very analogous to an arms race. Who’s going to be the first with a water-cooled, overclocked, dual-quad-SLi rig that can run Crysis at an insane resolution with every setting jacked to the point of no return? This is the disarray that Cliff Blizenski was speaking of when talking to Stephen Totilo of the MTV Multiplayer blog.

Arguably the biggest factor of the “disarray” that the PC is facing is piracy, which inadvertently causes more and more former big-time PC exclusive titles to make their way to consoles.

Go back two years, and I ‘m fairly certain that you’d be hard-pressed to find a hardcore PC gamer that wouldn’t scoff at the mere idea of Unreal Tournament or Command & Conquer making their way to a console.

This is the very reason that World of Warcraft and every Sims 2 expansion on the face of this earth has managed to stay at the top of the charts. Those are the games that are scaled back to the point that they will run on any computer released within the past 6 years, give or take a few.

The recent release of SteamWorks further solidifies Valve’s dedication to the PC as a viable platform and marks a milestone in PC gaming. SteamWorks consists of a wide variety of development tools that may be useful to developers of all sizes.

Fast-forward a few weeks and we’ll see Microsoft and Havok following suit. Microsoft unvieled the DreamSpark intiative, which makes a suite of Microsoft tools available for students. Not long after, Havok announced that they will be releasing Havok Complete, their solution to physics and animation in May 2008.

The big bullet point is that all of these companies have (or are in the process of) releasing these tools for free, effectively making it available and possible for anyone and everyone to make a game should they have the patience, drive, and dedication.

Through 2008, we may see PC gaming evolve into something we don’t recognize – and some of us may not like it.

For example, take Battlefield: Heroes. Although it’s very much an off-shoot of the Battlefield series as we know it, it makes a statement about the position that the PC market is in right now. For those that may not know, Battlefield: Heroes is a free-to-play online multiplayer FPS that will launch this summer.

The free-to-play model will work on two fronts, with advertising that EA is claiming wil be non-intrusive, along with content that may be paid for (nature of said content has yet to be revealed) that won’t severely cripple gamers that are playing for free.

The outcome of this ‘experiment’ may be indicative of the way that the PC gaming market will go in the forseeable future.

Current and future UE3 clients will be eligible to witness these latest upgrades and enhancements within Epic’s expo suite at GDC.

The first presentation on February 20th will see Epic Games’ Programmer Martin Sweitzer dropping some programming edu-mi-cation on your ass, followed by an Unreal Tournament 3 postmortem two days later presented by President Michael Capps and Producer Jeff Morris.

You can look forward to GDC ’08 coverage as it happens here on Ripten.

Source: Next-Gen.biz

Many of you will have heard the buzz about user created maps making their way to the Playstation version of the game, but you might have thought that this first time console modding was probably not that good. Well, you’ll be pleased to know you’re completely wrong, folks. Unreal Tournament’s modding system has changed the way console FPSs are presented.

Since the game’s release, there have been over 16 fully functional user created maps made available for download to the PS3, and it doesn’t stop there. You can also throw in two new camera angles (an over the shoulder “Gears of War style” view, and a distant Third Person “SOCOM style” view), an improved visual color, and new game modes. And here is the kicker: it’s completely free of charge.

All you need is an external memory unit for your PS3, whether it’s a USB Jump drive or a Memory stick. This has got to be by far the best rendition of Downloadable Content.

The support behind modding for the PS3 is simply amazing, with modders hard at work creating new maps, game modes and mutators. They have placed themselves as the number one reason to go out and pick up a copy of Unreal Tournament 3 for the PS3. Strong, engaged communities have made UT3 a must buy.