GameSpot's On the Spot video feature sees Bio Brand Manager David Silverman demonstrating Awakening.  There's around 8 minutes of footage and discussion, so well worth a look.

A new free DLC from the dripfeed has been released for Mass Effect 2 - the Arc Projector heavy weapon:

Attention all Cerberus Network members: The Arc Projector heavy weapon has been deployed for field use.

The Arc Projector is capable of discharging a massive electrical blast that can jump to multiple targets. For more information, check out the Arsenal on the website.

GameBanshee catches up with BioWare's Ferret Baudoin to discuss Awakening:

GB: By the time a character reaches level 20 in the base game, there really aren't any desirable talents left to choose from. How do you intend to keep things fresh and ensure that we have plenty of appealing advancement options when the level cap is raised even further? How many more spells and other talents are you implementing in the expansion? Will these fall under the existing talent trees (Archery, Entropy, Two-Handed, etc.) or will we be seeing additional talent categories for each class? Care to give us an example or two?

Ferret: When we extended the level cap in Awakening (from 25 to 35) we also added a ton of new spells and abilities. There’s over 50 new ones to choose from, so there’s more new high level talents than you can get with one character. There’s two basic type of talents we’ve added – the talents that support our new specializations and those which are available to the core classes. The ones that give more goodies to the core classes fall into existing talent trees. Each type of weapon combat has another talent chain added to it. So two handed weapons, weapon and shield, dual wield, and archery all have four new abilities apiece. Mages get two new spell chains, as well. You have to be high level to pick up the new talents, but they’re often more potent than anything you’ve seen before.

An example of a warrior ability is “Peon’s Plight”. This ability allows a warrior to outright kill any one normal or critter level enemy, or deal a lot of damage to anyone else. This allows warriors to really change the tide of many battles. For example, if you start a fight and you see a non-elite Hurlock emissary in the back ranks – just bull rush him and lop off his head in one fell swoop. Conan would be proud.

Another awesome ability that both warriors and rogues can pick up is “Accuracy”. It’s a modal ability for archers that once activated increases the effectiveness of all of your ranged combat stats. The difference is immediate and noticeable. If you get the entire Archery ability chain it feels like Legolas has got your back.

Diehard GameFan has the most detailed X360 review of Risen I can recall, although their scoring system seems a bit uneven.  Ultimately the game is praised for RPG fans but criticised as unappealing to the console mainstream:

Risen is the sort of game that will appeal to diehard fans of the action RPG genre, as there’s enough good elements to the game to make it enjoyable, but it’s more than likely to put off more console-oriented fans because of its obtuse nature and more casual fans because of its stylistic and mechanical issues. The story is interesting and varied enough to keep the game going, the visuals and audio are competent and inoffensive, and the gameplay offers enough variety to be interesting. There’s plenty of variety to the things the player can do, and plenty of challenge to the game all around, and with a long quest and different factions to ally with, there’s plenty of play and replay value for anyone interested in the game. However, console-oriented action RPG fans may well be put off by the often unhelpful quest maps and lack of solid directions to objectives and the unimpressive presentation, while more casual genre fans may be put off by the, “exploration equals death,” mentality, the long time it takes to achieve any sort of notable character development, the lack of attachment to the main character as either a personal avatar or a character in the story, and the general technical issues. If you’re looking for a challenging and time consuming action RPG with some depth and substance and you don’t mind some mechanical issues and presentation flaws, Risen will be worth a look, but anyone looking for something a little more technically competent and polished may find this a bit too flawed and archaic to enjoy.

GameBanshee writes in about a press release they received from German bitComposer Games, announcing the acquisition of the Jagged Alliance license and the development of (a new) Jagged Alliance 3.  You may recall Strategy First spent a long time fumbling around with failed Russian partnerships - hopefully bitComposer can do better, though nothing is know about the actual development team or goals at this stage.  A partial snip:

bitComposer Games Acquires the License for Jagged Alliance

– Jagged Alliance 3: a Strategy-Genre Classic Gets Revamped and Re-released –

Eschborn/Frankfurt, March 09, 2010: Preliminary development work has started on Jagged Alliance 3, the new episode in the internationally successful Jagged Alliance series. The German publisher bitComposer Games has secured the full rights to the license from Strategy First, and will publish this famous strategy brand with roleplay elements worldwide. The aim is to preserve the popular basic concept of the previous versions and place it in a contemporary setting. A specific release date for Jagged Alliance 3 has not yet been confirmed, but a 2011 release is anticipated.

This week's update for DoubleBear's Zombie RPG brings news about the characters and their clothing. It is done via Iron Tower Studios, who hosts the game:

Since the team is rather small, we can't do a lot of characters. It's so small, in fact, that we're only going to do two, a male and a female version (personally, I like to call them Zombob and Zombette). That means, for example, that all male characters will share the same face [About the faces, we are going to have a couple of variations. Perhaps a scarred one, and definitely an old guy one, just like AoD - Oscar]. We're hoping that you won't notice with the camera zoomed out as much as it will be. Luckily, we can still make variations, through clothing, accessories and haircuts [Note: and facial hair and skin tones]. I'd have loved to be able to show you that, but we don't actually have any assets that can be swapped here yet. Expect an update specifically about all that when we've got a fancy and varied assortment of moustaches.

A hands on preview for Dragon Age: The Awakening can be found at Inc Gamers.
They seem to think that more of the same is a good thing. Their focus is on Vigil's Keep which they find very different from the original Dragon Age game -  (some spoilers to follow):

Once you fend off the Darkspawn in the initial attack you're granted control of it and, indeed, the title of Arl, essentially making you the ruler of Amaranthine. In a fashion inspired by the class keeps from Baldur's Gate II, all the problems of both Vigil's Keep and the region on the whole become yours. With the increase in Darkspawn attacks, will you send soldiers to defend the city, or spread them out throughout the countryside to keep the farmers alive? Will you focus on expanding trade to maintain and build up the region? Can you spare the manpower to guard ore deposits so that your soldiers' weapons and armour are improved, or will you have them defend a quarry so that Vigil's Keep's walls can be reinforced?  

If this sounds like Bioware were inspired by the classs keep of BG2, I wouldn't be at all surprised.

Bioware has released  patch 1.03  for Dragon Age: Origins. Here's the patch notes:

Various changes have been made to code and resources to support the Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening expansion pack. Most of these changes do not affect Origins itself.
Some players were experiencing increasingly long load times. A major cause of this problem has been fixed.
At higher levels, non-player characters now receive a bonus to armor penetration. This mitigates an unintentional imbalance with well-armored high-level characters, since armor penetration previously did not scale as aggressively as armor itself did.
Elite-rank enemies (lieutenants) can no longer be shattered. This preserves the intended tactical design of many combat encounters.
Portraits for summoned creatures (like a ranger's wolf) were displaying improperly while in the party camp. This no longer occurs.

As you can see many of these changes are identical to the changes occuring in the patch released for PS3 earlier.

EA will publish BHG's single player RPG say Gamespot.

Code-named "Project Mercury," the single-player RPG is being developed by Rise of Nations studio Big Huge Games. (After then-owner THQ threatened to close the studio in 2009, 38 Studios stepped in and bought the Maryland-based developer.) It will be an all-new intellectual property co-created fantasy by comic-book artist Todd McFarlane (Spawn) and author R.A. Salvatore (The DemonWars Saga), who will provide art direction for the game. Both men helped Schilling found 38 Studios--then called Green Monster Games--in 2006, and respectively serve as art director and "executive creator of worlds" at the Maynard, Massachusetts studio. The game will not be based on any of Salvatore's or MacFarlane's previous work.

Though 38 Studios is a relatively new operation, Project Mercury has some veteran development talent behind it. Its project lead is Ken Rolston, who was lead designer on Bethesda Softworks' acclaimed high-fantasy RPGs The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. Several other Bethesda vets are working on the project, as well as a senior designer from Lucasarts' the Force Unleashed. Veterans of Civilization and Civilization II are also on board.

According to EA Partners general manager David DeMartini, Rolston and his team will also be able to tap the minds of EA's own RPG powerhouse. "The guys at BioWare were actually involved in the early discussions with the folks at Big Huge," he told GameSpot. "They've had an opportunity to have some preliminary discussions and preliminary talks….So, I certainly think that you could expect strong collaboration that would include the BioWare team."

Depths of Peril is both one of my favourite indie games and one of the best hack'n'slash action/RPGs I've played.  Soldak's third game - Din's Curse - is just around the corner and I've been fiddling with the beta.  Here's a snip from the preview:

I spent a fair bit of my time playing a Rogue and then a Conjurer – and the gameplay was quite different. As a Rogue, I used Sneak to move around and explore (finding the gates and stairs on each level is important) and pick off trailing mobs to thin the herd, all without being seen. As a Conjurer, I used a variety of interesting summons and necromantic abilities, such as changing into a Lich and raising skeletons. Finally, I mixed a Thief (one of the Rogue Specialities) and a Fire Mage (Wizard); this was all sorts of chaotic fun – sneak into the middle of a group of mobs and then unleash fiery Armageddon.

Read it all here.

A fully localised German release of Armoured Princess will be available in April, according to this PR (partial snip):

Hamburg, 08.03.2010 – In Großbritannien, den USA und vielen weiteren Ländern ist King‘s Bounty: Armored Princess bereits seit Ende November 2009 erhältlich. Die Fachpresse lobt den Nachfolger des Strategietitels King’s Bounty: The Legend in den höchsten Tönen. Spieler in Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz müssen sich bisher mit dem Import oder Download der englischen Version begnügen – das ändert sich Anfang April 2010. Dann nämlich veröffentlichen dtp entertainment und 1C Company King’s Bounty: Armored Princess, entwickelt von Katauri Interactive, in Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz – und zwar komplett auf Deutsch.

Thanks Alrik and Gorath.

Six new screens from Spellforce 2: Faith in Destiny at Worthplaying.

Time for a new update on Scars of War.  This week, Gareth takes advice from the Rampant Coyote but promptly ignores it:

I read this last week on Coyote’s blog and thought ‘Hmmm, that sounds like a great idea! I’ve had a host of small, annoying issues bogging me down on the code front, what if I put all that aside and just jam at max speed all weekend, I wonder how much progress I could make?’ It seemed like a great idea and I was all fired up to do it. The goal was to throw together my existing code with some hacked-in workarounds to the issues I’m currently dealing with, build some city zones using the art I’ve already got + some quick and dirty prototype art and get some playable if ugly zones out of it over the weekend.

J.E. Sawyer has written a blog on the Obsidian forums titled High Level Writing Principles and helpfully filed under the category "dachsund grooming tips".  Here's the intro:

At work, we have a lot of rules for how to write. These range from punctuation (single-spacing after terminal punctuation) to spelling ("all right" vs. "alright") to structural (where a "goodbye" response should be relative to a "start combat" response and where that should be relative to a "friendly" response). Every project has a document (or documents) on the specific guidelines for that project. In spite of all the details, there are certain high-level principles that tend to be common. Okay, maybe it's just in my mind, but here are principles that I believe are important for writing player-driven dialogue in choice-heavy RPGs.

Sega is taking appointments from the public to see Alpha Protocol at GDC in San Francisco on Wednesday.  If you'll be in the area, head here to register your interest.

Brother None has penned a preview of Mount & Blade: Warband over at GameBanshee.  I haven't been paying too much attention to this but I hadn't realised the RPG elements are scaled back for MP:

One unsurprising thing should be obvious from the above description: Warband's multiplayer opts to focus purely on one side of the Mount & Blade experience, that of medieval warfare simulator. Sure, stats are still there for different troops, and you can customize to some extent, but as characters are dumped for every new session, it doesn't allow you to tie a single character to your account, nor does it allow for experience to be gained and progress to be made. There is no imbalance between characters which is a good thing for the multiplayer experience, but also means the outcome of fights is purely dependent on the player's (twitch) skill.

Kalypso Media has picked up the publishing duties for Disciples III in North America, Western Europe and Asia Pacific.  The release window is "Summer 2010" and here's the official PR:

Kalypso Media to Bring Disciples III to North America, Western Europe and Asia Pacific

Epic turn-based sword and sorcery title coming in summer 2010 for PC

Worms, Bracknell, Baltimore - March 8th, 2010
Kalypso Media, a global publisher of award-winning PC and console games, is pleased to announce an agreement with game developer and publisher Akella that grants Kalypso Media the rights to market and publish Disciples III: Renaissance in North America, Western Europe and Asia Pacific territories. Disciples III: Renaissance is a standalone turn-based RPG/strategy game set in an expansive fantasy world, offering players action, adventure and glory. Stunning 3D environments, three playable races, and multiplayer functionality all combine to offer an outstanding gameplay experience. Kalypso Media will release Disciples III: Renaissance in summer 2010 on Windows PC.

“Disciples III: Renaissance is a perfect fit with Kalypso’s portfolio of top-quality strategy games, and we are excited to partner with Akella to release this title to gamers around the world,” said Simon Hellwig, Managing Director, Kalypso Media. “Disciples III is poised to take this award-winning strategy franchise to the next level by appealing to existing fans and newcomers to the series.”

“Everyone at Akella has a deep respect and love for the Disciples brand,” said Dmitry Arkhipov, Vice-President of Development at Akella. “Our team is dedicated and passionate about ensuring that Disciples III: Renaissance takes the franchise further by providing fans more dynamic gameplay and deeper strategies in an incredibly atmospheric and rich 3D world. Kalypso is the perfect partner to work with to ensure that Disciples III: Renaissance will be delivered to gamers around the world.”

Disciples III: Renaissance is the next title in the award winning Disciples series and represents a leap forward in the evolution of the turn-based RPG/strategy genre. Building on the successes of the first two games, Disciples III: Renaissance introduces a host of new features as well as the compelling gameplay that made the previous titles so popular.

Key features:
• Three playable races - The Empire, the Legions of the Damned and the Elven Alliance. Each race has unique units and city designs.
• Cities, locations, units and other game assets are now represented in full 3D
• Advances in gameplay allow increased fluidity in multiplayer games and less downtime in single-player games
• A new upgrade system allows the player to assign attributes to their leader units. This system employs inventories and new stats and abilities
• Visual representation of characters’ equipped armor, weapons and artifacts

Grab some new screens at Worthplaying, by the way.

IGN is calling for questions for a planned Deus Ex 3 community interview.  Head over to add your own questions and for the rest of us, this presumably means we'll be seeing some solid info soon.

Thanks, Omega!

Omega writes that Diablo fans are up in arms (again?), this time over the "wimpy" male wizard.  Gamegrep and IncGamers both have articles summarising the uproar on Blizzard's forums.  From Gamegrep:

Earlier this week, Blizzard revealed the in-game model of Diablo 3's male Wizard, and fans of the series were not happy. The official forums were flooded with complaints about the Wizard's appearance, calling him "wimpy," "effeminate," "gay," "a transvestite," and even compared his animation to a "belly dance."

A roundtable discussion can be found at Bonus Rounds on the GameTrailer website. Participants are Greg Zeschuk, Bioware, David Jaffe, Eat Sleep Play,  and N'Gai Croal Video Game Consultant. In this first part of the conversation,  they talk about storytelling and
[i]The Bioware Manifesto[/i]

Vince over at Iron Tower has penned a preview of Din's Curse:

Basically, the dungeons are no longer static. Things are brewing and shit is piling up, getting awfully close to the fan. If you're told that some guy needs to be rescued, it means that he's fighting mobs of monsters as we speak. He may last awhile or he may not (depends on the difficulty level). If you're told that some monsters are planning a raid, it doesn’t mean that they will be waiting forever and ever for you to show up. It actually does mean that they are planning a raid and unless you drop everything and go knock some sense into them, there will be some raiding and pillaging tonight. Once the current town is saved, you get your reward and can either continue playing at a slower, more traditional pace, or move to the next town with increasingly bigger problems and deeper dungeons.

GameBanshee has learned Artur Ganszyniec - principal designer for an unnamed AAA project (read: Witcher 2) has left CD Projekt Red.  Artur was previouly lead story designer on the first Witcher.

I'm not sure where they came from but Duck and Cover has the first hi-res screens from Fallout: New Vegas that we've seen.  There are over a dozen random screens, including one of the companion control wheel.

Omega sends this pair of BioShock 2 reviews with contrasting opinions.  AggroGamer finds it emotionally compelling:

This is a must buy for anyone that loved playing BioShock the first time. Hands down and without question. It continues the story of Rapture and its inhabitants as well as what still continues to be the issues in this "Utopia," humans themselves. All in a great storytelling fashion with some heart wrenching moments to keep you enthralled to the screen and wanting just a bit more.

...but the NY Times isn't so sure this anything more than a competent sequel spin-off, despite enjoying it:

Financially, sequels are inevitable. But creatively, I am not sure that every great game is served by becoming a franchise. BioShock has gone from an auteur-driven project to a corporate asset. I enjoyed the roughly 12 hours I spent getting through the main campaign of BioShock 2, but it will not stay with me as the first game did. I know there are still fabulous stories in Rapture. But perhaps I have heard them all already.

Soldak Entertainment has released another beta pacth update to their Din's Curse game. The beta patch will then be version .0908 - here's the notes:

• added to credits
• fixed level 1 scree showing up in higher levels (Gorgarax)
• fixed throw cursor on Mac
• fixed keys, flaming oil, and ice bombs not spawning correctly at higher levels (Kruztee)
• added a quest from the vendor (essentially a bet)
• now experience is last part of quest reward so that other level related rewards behave a bit better
• monsters will no longer attack traps on the ground because they hurt them (FloodSpectre/Wantonius)
• changed Next Enemy key name to Next Enemy in Melee Range (Howler)
• shift left clicking on a stackable item now splits 1 item from the stack (Howler)
• now auto pick up money if no other players in game
• fixed serrated arrow deep wounds chance (Caal)
• fixed a couple more places where delivery/retrieve wording didn't match correctly (Cadfan)
• difficulty level is now reset when you enter setup world screen (timeh)
• now check if npcs are petrified for fail condition (tkirby2003)
• updated Staying Alive/Death in manual
• better explained using skills in help/manual
• added Inventory Screen help topic
• fixed SwitchTo2ndWeaponSet / SwitchTo1stWeaponSet
• now color code weapon set I & II with green and red depending on if
• you have a weapon equipped or not
• if enter dungeon with no weapon now warn player
• fixed a double plural issue in one find quest (FloodSpectre)
• should now get credit for kills when you break a poison barrel and it kills a monster (FloodSpectre)
• fixed CastTime
• curses now have an area of effect centered at mouse (cthonic)
• decreased curses duration from 30.0 to 20.0
• fixed a skill/animation timing issue that is more noticable on skills like zeal (Gutsman)
• now reaction skills like riposte will work on auto target (Nemhir)
• now magic critical hits count in combat reaction stuff (Nemhir)
• the noise range on pain is longer related to victim's aggression range
• now thief's Concentration: Poison skill boosts archer's poison arrow skill (FloodSpectre)
• now show chance to pick lock on lock pick skill (FloodSpectre)
• got rid of File/Edit menus on Mac OS bar (Amberjoy)
• picking a lock now gives you an extra chance to disarm any potential traps also
• completely reworked stored lightning skill (Gutsman)
• fixed a or an issue with untranslated text (icekrystal10)
• fixed some spells like ShockWave checking if can see mouse position when it shouldn't
• increased alcohol, acid, and magma AddAdditionalChance
• increased alcohol, acid, and ice spread chances
• now spiders can spawn webs just as obstacles for enemies (getter77)
• now can choose slow pace, normal, or fast pace on new world (Lyranaar/derailed)
• increased level up volume some (Lyranaar)
• reworded location for some quests to One Possible Location (Archon)
• now get a health bar for person you are escorting (Ephemera/Flailsnail)
• can now switch master server zones without leaving game (Twotricks)
• increased most set bonuses

Omega sends in this short review of Dragon Age at Mac Life.  The score is 4.5/5 and here's a snip, though I'm not sure everyone will agree:

BioWare has never made a casual RPG, and the robust Dragon Age is no exception. You’ll customize your character and their specialization, leading to variations like a berserker fighting style for your warrior, shape-shifting or healing abilities for your mage, and improved lock picking for your rogue. Since you can add more characters for your party and switch between them as needed, you end up with broad yet specific control over every encounter.

Managing your party effectively requires you to directly control one character and assign behaviors to the other members of your party. For example, if you want your archer and mage to provide covering fire while the others attack with swords, just open the Tactics menu and assign a behavior, and the character will follow it as needed.

Basilisk is calling for beta testers for Eschalon: Book II.  Head here to apply - but for the rest of us, this means the release is getting close-ish.

DaggerXL has moved to 0.16 in short order, with elements of the UI now functioning:

I’ve released version 0.16 with some of the UI is implemented. After the title screen you see the Load/New/Exit screen – Load will (for now) load your quick save game (same as F2 once you’re in-game), Start will begin in Privateer’s Hold (the previous default) and Exit will immediately exit the program. Hitting the highlight keys will have the same effect (L, S and E).

Thanks, Toni!