There's been some big news as of late on the new Underworld game, currently in the midst of its Kickstarter campaign. The game is close to being 80% funded at the halfway point, so things are looking good. Hopefully a late push will not only get the game funded but also allow it to hit some of its stretch goals. Pledge if you haven't. If you have, consider upping your pledge.

It was announced a few days ago that Otherside Entertainment will be working with none other than Stephen Russell. Most know Stephen as the voice of the cynical Thief, Garrett, but he has lent his voice to many other characters in Looking Glass games over the years, in addition to working on major titles such as Skyrim and Fallout 3. It's great to have Stephen on board, especially after he was snubbed last year for the new Thief game.

It was also announced that Terri Brosius, ex-Looking Glass designer and voice actor for some very memorable Looking Glass characters will also be working with the Otherside team. At this point, it looks like Terri will be primarily providing voice talent, but you never know where else things may lead.

Otherside will be engaging in several twitch sessions over the next several weeks, playing through some classic Looking Glass games with the original developers and providing commentary and insight. The schedule is as follows, all times EST:

-Wednesday, February 18th - Thief - 3-6PM, w/special guest, Randy Smith
-Wednesday, February 25th - System Shock, time TBA
-Wednesday, March 4th - Ultima Underworld, time TBA

Check out the twitch stream here: http://www.twitch.tv/otherside_entertainment

This could be the start of big things for Looking Glass fans. As many people know, a new game studio called OtherSide Entertainment was started up last year by Looking Glass founder Paul Neurath. Their focus, as stated on their web site, is to reboot classic games franchises. Well, they’ve done just that, in the form of a new Underworld game (minus the Ultima branding). The new game is called Underworld Ascendant.

A Kickstarter project was launched last Wednesday (February 4th, 2015) to fund the game, and they are already well over half way to their goal. It’s also been revealed that several ex-Looking Glass employees have joined the studio and are working on the game, including Tim Stellmach, Steve Pearsall, and Robb Waters. In addition to that, Warren Spector and Austin Grossman will be advising and acting as consultants on the project.

Check out the Kickstarter page and pledge if you haven’t already. There are some interesting stretch goals available that include adding new areas to explore, new races, and even a level editor. Strong support for this title will likely lead to more Looking Glass type games in the future. Very exciting stuff!

Lunar Software's alpha-demo of their upcoming first-person game, Routine, made quite a splash around the web, and particularly at TTLG where we've been carrying the System Shock torch for over a decade. We caught up with Lunar dev, Aaron Foster for a quick Q&A about Routine and what hopeful fans can expect from this promising indie title.
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Rock Paper Shotgun posted the news the Dear Esther was going retail. What followed included some comments from creators Dan Pinchbeck and Robert Briscoe.

Briscoe:

... [W]ithout talking figures at this point, I can tell you it will be extremely affordable, and Im going to do everything I can to make sure what you get in return is worth every penny! This is the culmination of two years of the most dedicated and creative work i've ever done, and im so happy to see it so warmly welcomed as an indie title. There will be lots more info to come, and im looking forward hearing more of your thoughts!

Pinchbeck:

So three things, really. Firstly, going commercial lets us do things we couldn't have otherwise done, like reach out to gamers beyond the mod community, which means we can get our game out to anyone who hasn't got Half Life (yeah, I know! Apparently, there are a few of them out there, in their Fallout-style bunkers). It also means we can leverage some additional investment into the project so we can do things like re-orchestrate the soundtrack, which means you're going to get a massive level-up for Jessica Curry's work, which is completely brilliant.

Secondly, Rob's put a year of his life into this and produced something which is as good as any commercial game environment out there - and that's just the art, let alone the detail and design overhaul of the player experience - and I think he deserves to get paid for that, basically, and so does everyone else involved. So that's a factor too.

Finally, what's basically going to happen is that profits get broken down to make sure everyone gets paid, and then a stream of cash goes directly into a running budget which does just what Persus-9 says - it works to build thechineseroom towards a greater financial independence. And this is my current beef with games research - there's not enough experimentation going on, not enough builds to try things out and innovate and support games as a medium by not just writing theory by actually doing development... so if we can start to prove you can make games that work commercially (and creatively, natch) as games but also are these high-risk experimental research tools, then we can start coming back at the criticisms of the redundancy of games research and rebuild a bit of worth in the eyes of the games industry and gamers. Or something like that.

We'll release a lot more information in the very near future, but we are really aware that pricing and value is critical and getting the balance between a high quality product and value for money is pretty central to how we're approaching things...

Additionally:

- The removal of the old Dear Esther from the ModDB was a mistake. It will be returned.
- Translations will likely be in the form of a separate downloadable community created language pack.
- There will be subtitles.

I should have mentioned this a long time ago but have been absent as of lately, so here goes: Art Min, one of the great LG alum (System Shock, Terra Nova, FireTeam, etc. fame), has start his own gaming company, Chasing Dog Studios, and his first game has been released! From the site:

Help Tino save his fruit stand from becoming a parking lot. Lead Rikki, the fruit-gathering monkey, to fill the customers' orders in a market full of fruit. Use Rikki's swing and the many Power-Ups to fill orders faster and with more flair! Earn tips, sell fruit... Save Tino's Fruit Stand!

Tino's Fruit Stand is a puzzle game where you work to pay back the loan and upgrade the stand to save the family store. You'll enjoy the 50 arcade levels that complement the story.

You can download the demo by going to the site, and you can purchase the game from there as well. Support Art and his company -- Good luck selling fruit!

Mind Control Software, i.e. Andrew Leker and Marc LeBlanc, are having their game Oasis promoted on Shockwave.com. I did the free trial of the game, which allows you to play for 60 minutes, and managed to use them all up consecutively, i.e. once I started, I kept playing for an hour. For me, that’s impressive. Discerning fans of puzzle games may want to give their Egyptian-themed product a look. Discuss your thoughts here.

Tribes: Vengeance, in development by Irrational Games, is accepting applications for a closed beta test. As a closed beta test, this will be a very selective process, thus you're likely to only get hired unless you're a proven software tester with QA experience. One can only hope, anyway. Linkage.

Black Cat Game's recently released UT2k4 mod, Alien Swarm, has been reviewed at Mod'n'mod and has been given a very favorable score of 9.4.

Alien Swarm has an excellent presentation. It has the best GUI I have seen (talking about professional quality design here), it provides players with lots of info and a tutorial, and it gets the atmosphere of the theme right, while its overhead view sets it appart from the rest of the modding world (especially when using a FPS engine). And it is co-op. So there is no excuse for you not to download Alien Swarm, unless you don't like good, fun games. That's all for now I guess, and as always...we uploaded some 38 screenshots for you!

I imagine the creators of Alien Swarm are feeling pretty proud right now. :)

Congratulations to Black Cat Games! Their UT2k4 mod Alien Swarm has been released today, and high praise abounds. Their website is offline at the moment, no doubt to being hammered with traffic, but the official forums have a thread with download mirrors.

Alien Swarm is a top-down squad-based multiplayer sci-fi shooter, developed by the taffers who brought us Thievery and are bringing is Nightblade.