It's Meant to Be Played
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Issue 10 $3.99 (where sold) THE WAY It’s meant to be played Ultimate PC Gaming with GeForce All the best holiday games with the power of NVIDIA Far Cry’s creators outclass its already jaw-dropping technology Battlefi eld 2142 with an epic new sci-fi battle World of Warcraft: Company of Heroes Warhammer: The Burning Crusade Mark of Chaos THE NEWS Notebooks are set to transform Welcome... PC gaming Welcome to the 10th issue of The Way It’s Meant To Be Played, the he latest must-have gaming system is… T magazine dedicated to the very best in a notebook PC. Until recently considered mainly PC gaming. In this issue, we showcase a means for working on the move or for portable 30 games, all participants in NVIDIA’s presentations, laptops complete with dedicated graphic The Way It’s Meant To Be Played processing units (GPUs) such as the NVIDIA® GeForce® program. In this program, NVIDIA’s Go 7 series are making a real impact in the gaming world. Latest thing: Laptops developer technology engineers work complete with dedicated The advantages are obvious – gamers need no longer be graphic processing units with development teams to get the are making an impact in very best graphics and effects into tied to their desktop set-up. the gaming world. their new titles. The games are then The new NVIDIA® GeForce® Go 7900 notebook rigorously tested by three different labs GPUs are designed for extreme HD gaming, and gaming at NVIDIA for compatibility, stability, and hardware specialists such as Alienware and Asus have performance to ensure that any game seen the potential of the portable platform. Alienware’s carrying the TWIMTBP logo will deliver newly available 17” Aurora M9700 even incorporates two For more on these systems see http://www.alienware. the ultimate install-and-play experience NVIDIA® GeForce® Go 7900 GS GPUs and features the com and www.dell.com . with an NVIDIA GeForce-based graphics card, especially in nForce-chipset based NVIDIA® nForce® 4 SLI. Leading manufacturer Dell is For details on the offerings by Asus, turn first to page PCs, whether with Intel or AMD CPUs. also upgrading its XPS M1710 system to incorporate the 28 of this issue, where we reveal details of Asus’ plans to This is one of the most exciting NVIDIA® GeForce® Go 7950 GTX GPU. transform notebook gaming. holiday seasons the PC has ever seen. The latest graphics and PC platform Meltdown: The long-awaited hardware from NVIDIA provides the STALKER has all the atmosphere most state-of-the-art platform for and experience you’d hope for in post-meltdown Chernobyl. interactive entertainment. This season’s titles are all amazing, regardless of the genre of game that you play, and all prove that an NVIDIA PC continues to set the high bar for interactive entertainment. I hope you enjoy the magazine – let us know if there’s anything you think should be included in these pages. Bill Rehbock Senior Director, Developer/ Publisher Relations and Consumer Awareness, NVIDIA [email protected] STALKER on the prowl again In This Issue... GSC were demonstrated to great them together, we realized that we T he long-awaited STALKER, News ................................................................ 3 the action game set in acclaim at the Games Convention had to redress the balancing in order The latest products from NVIDIA. post-meltdown Chernobyl, is now in Leipzig in August. Helen Jones, to achieve the atmosphere and Games ............................................................. 4 confirmed to be released in the UK PR manager at publisher THQ, experience that was the essence of Previews of 30 forthcoming TWIMTBP first three months of 2007. New said: “Approximately a year ago, STALKER. STALKER is very much on titles including Company of Heroes. screens and game levels from the after we’d finished all the individual track and all the hard work that GSC Cover game: Crysis................................. 8 Kiev-based programming team at game components and brought has put into it is paying off.” An in-depth look at Crytek’s ground- breaking game of action and strategy. Feature – notebook gaming..........28 Asus designed a notebook specially for the Electronic Sports World Cup. The Future Network plc is a public company. Printed in the USA © Future 2006. Windows Vista ........................................30 All images and materials are property of their respective owners. All rights reserved. Produced by Future Plus The second part of this feature looks at Cover: © 2006 Crytek. All Rights Reserved. Crytek, Crysis and CryENGINE are trademarks or 30 Monmouth Street, Bath, BA1 2BW, UK registered trademarks of Crytek. Electronic Arts, EA, and the EA logo are trademarks or registered the features of Microsoft Direct X10. trademarks of Electronic Arts Inc. in the U.S. and/or other countries. All other trademarks are the Printed by Schumann Printers Inc, WI, USA property of their respective owners. EA™ is an Electronic Arts™ brand. Visit NVIDIA online: www.nvidia.com 3 THE WAY Broken Sword: The Angel Of Death Publisher: THQ Developer: Revolution Release: Out now S ince his debut in Broken Sword: Built using a brand new game engine, this The Shadow Of The Templars, latest epic delivers a richer game world, more reluctant hero George Stobbart has believable characters and a truly cinematic defeated Mayan gods, foiled evil flavor. Thanks to the new proprietory Virtual masterminds and even battled dragons. Actor System, players can read characters’ Now the multi-million selling star is emotions, build up relationships and truly get back… and looking forward to the peace involved in the story. The plot brilliantly mixes of a nine-to-five office job. Needless to fact, fiction, conspiracy theories, cerebral say it’s not long before he’s on a brand new puzzles and race-against-time action. It adds adventure, searching for a missing woman up to the most dynamic, detailed, action- and an artifact of great and terrible power. packed Broken Sword adventure yet. Q Impressive comeback: The brilliant Broken Sword series makes a triumphant return, with the action powered by a muscular new graphics engine. Case study: Dungeon Siege II: Broken World Publisher: 2K Games Developer: Gas Powered Games Release: Out now P icking up right where the bestselling sequel left off, Dungeon Siege II: Broken World serves up an all- new campaign packed with wondrous environments, formidable enemies, monstrous beasts and a whole load of new features. The ultimate aim is to hunt down the Dark Wizard and undo the evil brought to the world of Aranna, but this will require fighting through 10 hours of intense action, while an additional five hours of optional quests and levels further fleshes out the tale. More than 40 new monsters feature this time around, plus new weapons, armor and magical items. Pets have also been added to enhance the gameplay, along with new races, new powers and skills, and new character classes. Finally, a newly-refined tactical battle system deepens the fighting fantasy experience. Note that Dungeon Siege II: Broken World requires the full version of Dungeon Siege II to play. Q “... formidable enemies, monstrous beasts and a whole load of new Epic action: New lands, more outrageous creatures and a whole range of innovative features... ” extras make Dungeon Siege II: Broken World so much more than a simple add-on pack. 4 THE GAMES LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy Mix and match heroes, roam the universe... LEGO Star Wars is back Publisher: LucasArts Developer: TT Games Release: Fall 2006 A rm yourself with your best Han moments, from Darth Vader’s pursuit of for pulling enemies’ LEGO arms right out Solo quips and start practising that Princess Leia’s craft at the beginning of of their sockets! Darth Vader breathing – the inspired Episode IV to the final showdown on the Best of all, characters are now able digital collision between the world’s second Death Star (as seen in Episode VI). to ride creatures such as Banthas and favorite toy line and the ultimate movie Tauntauns, and even get in and out of series is back. Combining the endlessly Cast of millions vehicles including landspeeders, AT-STs and entertaining customization of LEGO with Expanding on the winning formula that speeder bikes. The vehicle-based levels are the plot, characters and action from made the first LEGO Star Wars such a free-roaming too, further opening up the George Lucas’ first three Star Wars films, hit, this all-new adventure now makes it lavish, LEGO-constructed environments. LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy possible to mix and match body parts from Then there’s the Free Play feature, which puts players in the thick of the battle more than 50 different playable characters, gives gamers the opportunity to explore the between the Galactic Empire and Rebel including Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, and Star Wars universe with greater freedom, Alliance. The results are stunning, action- Darth Vader, alongside cult favourites such even changing the whole storyline! packed, and even funny. as Greedo and the Jawas. The result is a Of course, every bit of action is depicted Because this is the Star Wars saga retold potential cast of millions of customized Star using an inimitable blend of cutting-edge with a LEGO twist, gamers now have the Wars heroes! There are now more character- TWIMTBP 3D with those familiar LEGO opportunity to build, as well as battle, their specific attacks too, ranging from Darth building blocks. That galaxy far, far, away has way through the trilogy’s most memorable Vader’s choke force to Chewbacca’s talent never looked so cute! Q Building blocks: All the classic scenes from the first three Star Wars David Dootson, Travellers Tales: films are brought to life, courtesy of a 3D engine “Working with NVIDIA on LEGO Star Wars II made a big blending classic LEGO difference.