The week in games

Every weekday MacCentral brings readers news about the latest happenings in the world of Macintosh games. There are always a few articles that don’t make it onto our regular news pages, which is why we have this weekly retrospective. The Week in Games also gives us a chance of checking in on other game-related content from around the Web.

Active Lancer details revealed

Freeverse Software announced that Active Lancer, its scrolling arcade-style shooter, has gone gold master and should soon be hitting store shelves. Now that Active Lancer is done, the game’s developer, Anton Tsai, has posted details, new screenshots and other content to his own Web site — check it out.

Blizzard whacks cheaters

On Blizzard Entertainment’s own Battle.net online game-matching service, the company announced continued efforts to close and ban players who exploit the games through hacks and cheats. “… we have permanently closed 276,000 StarCraft accounts, 86,000 Diablo II accounts, and 41,000 Warcraft III accounts,” said the company, and they’ve recorded the accompanying CD keys for all those accounts.

Defender of the Crown goes Shockwave

Old-school Mac gamers may be interested to learn that Cinemaware has released a Shockwave-based version of the classic game Defenders of the Crown, in which you compete for land and prestige in merry old England as one of four different knights, engaging in jousting competitions, attacking neighboring territories and more. The Shockwave version is the same as the mid-80s game, done to celebrate the new title Robin Hood: Defender of the Crown’s release (no Mac version thus announced for that game, alas).

Half-Life 2 source code stolen

Valve Software Managing Director Gabe Newell recently noted that the source code to Valve’s vaunted Half-Life 2 game has been stolen. While this doesn’t have any bearing on a potential Mac conversion of the game — as of this date still not announced — it’s of significant interest to people who have been tracking what’s been happening with the game.

Myst: The Book of Atrus chapter released

Myst fans may be interested in Cyan Worlds’ publication of a draft of the first chapter in Myst: The Book of Atrus, written in 1994 by Myst co-creator Ryan Miller. The chapter has been published to celebrate Myst’s 10th anniversary.

Savage: The Battle for Newerth coming to OS X

A discussion forum thread related to S2 Games’ Savage: The Battle for Newerth reveals that the company has ported the game to OS X, in just a matter of hours. It’s unclear exactly how the port is going to make its way out into the world, though it’s expected that a demo will be available and that you’ll be able to buy it directly from where the Windows version is now for sale. Savage is a game that combines real time strategy elements with 3D action elements. You can get more information about the game itself from S2 Games’ Web site.

Swap released

Phelios Inc. has released Swap, a new puzzle game. A trailer is available for viewing as well. Swap is a variation on the “match three or more similar colors together” idea, with four modes of play and other features.

Warcraft III ‘bonus map’ released

Want another map to play other gamers on using Warcraft III? Check out the Bonus Maps section of Blizzard’s Web site, now featuring a new addition called Typhoon. Typhoon joins Hellfire and Iceforge in the list of add-on maps you can download.

Elsewhere on the Web

MacGamer.com has posted a new View from Here editorial called The Vicious Cycle, discussing the constant need to upgrade computer hardware to keep systems playable. Inside Mac Games has posted its first look at Halo: Combat Evolved, coming soon to the Mac from MacSoft and Westlake Interactive. The Gamesome Mac QuickTime radio show last week interviewed Red Marble Games, developers of games including Bejeweled, Alchemy and most recently, Bugatron. Pregaming has posted an interview with Digital Eel, the game developers behind Strange Adventures in Infinite Space and Dr. Blob’s Organism. Apple’s Web site has posted a trailer showing Sveerz in action — it’s a new shareware game from Skunk Studios. Bare Feats has posted a comparison of Power Mac G5s that include benchmarks for the new Radeon 9800 Pro Mac Edition graphics card.

Closer to home

MacCentral this week brought news that Spiderweb Software is working on Blades of Avernum for Mac and Windows; the company plans to release the new role playing game early in 2004. Westlake Interactive updated its Project Status Web page with details that its Mac conversions of Halo: Combat Evolved and Age of Mythology, two projects to be published by MacSoft, have both hit their beta development milestones. Peripheral maker Belkin has released its Nostromo SpeedPad n52, a peripheral expressly designed for First Person Shooter enthusiasts and others who eschew “conventional” gamepads for the keyboard. StarROMs Inc. hopes to legitimize game ROM downloads (used in conjunction with emulators like MacMAME) by offering a commercial service that its developers like to the iTunes Music Store; the company’s getting off to a start with a library of vintage ROMs from Atari. Virtual Programming Ltd. noted this week that it’s shipping three new Mac games including MindRover (a robot programming game), Hearts of Iron (a World War II-era strategy game) and Player Manager 2003 (a soccer/football management game). Donohoe Digital LLC has released War! Age of Imperialism, a Java-based implementation of the Eagle Games strategy boardgame.

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