Activision by way of GTTV on Spike has released footage of the next Transformers game. Looks like action gets pretty heavy with huge boss fights! Spot any favorite Generation One characters? Certainly looks like Ironhide doing that take down at about 1 minute in! A good mix of shooting and hand to hand combat will be key for this game, hopefully the promise of this trailer is realized when the game releases in May.

Former 1UP and current Game Informer writer Phil Kollar has been teasing his big cover story for the magazine on twitter lately, and he just fessed up some details: “Yes, it’s a new Transformers game.”

Xbox 360, PS3, and PC versions of the game are on the way, tenatively titled “The War For Cybertron”
Artwork from the magazine (left) shows Optimus Prime, and theres a hearty influence of The War Within, as action will be set before our favorite transforming robots arrive on Earth.

TheAllspark broke the story earlier this evening, but Kollar says images and a trailer will be online later this week. Look for the issue of Game Informer at GameStop very soon.

This is the latest in Powet Editor Zac Shipley’s series on video game culture in Madison, WI for TheDailyPage.

Joe Rheaume’s Excellent Adventure: Chronotron goes from Madison to Penny Arcade Expo
The online comic strip and blog Penny Arcade has been a leading tastemaker in the gaming world for nearly a decade now. It has reached new heights over the last five years with its own convention, the Penny Arcade Expo, held every August in Seattle. Though gamers from all over the nation will find a weekend of fun and competition at this year’s con, Madison native Joe Rheaume will be an invited guest to show his hit time travel game Chronotron. >More

Play Chronotron now.

At a Star Trek event in Las Vegas today, Leonard Nimoy, better known to fans as the legendary Mister Spock, announced the biggest MMO since World Of Warcraft.

The game will be set several generations after the events of the last Star Trek theatrical film, Nemesis. This relieves my fear of the lack of progress after Voyager and Nemesis, Star Trek resorted to a prequel series called Enterprise and the 11th theatrical film will also take place before the original series. The game will start players out on their own ships in the Federation or Klingon Empire, with heavy emphasis on exploration in a vast space setting.

The Associated Press reports character creation will draw heavily from Star Trek’s database of species, but will also allow players to create new races. Any chance I can make Species 8472?

Star Trek Online has no set release date, but the above trailer is said to be in-engine and is supposedly very far along. Still, graphics and gameplay mechanics are secondary in a Massive Multiplayer Online game, which will likely require an extensive beta test and ongoing support. The game is being developed for PC, but developer Cryptic has teased an Xbox 360 or PS3 version may be released.

Star Trek Online details (AP)

Also of note: four new character posters from JJ Abram’s Star Trek are at Trekmovie.com, similar to ones handed out a Comicon.

Fans of Blizzard’s Diablo series may now rejoice. After 8 years of anticipation since Diablo II’s release and wondrous results, the big boys at Blizzard finally broke the long silence about another sequel to the dark fantasy MMORPG – Diablo III.

Diablo first came out in 1997 for the PC, and after a fairly positive reception, Diablo 2 followed a few years after with resounding fan approval. It featured elements that would later be seen in Blizzard’s money-making giant, World of Warcraft. After the success for the first two games, word of a third Diablo game remained strictly amongst fans, as Blizzard seemed to keep a tight lip as to even remote possibilities of a game ever being produced, and truly the idea was overshadowed once World of Warcraft came out. However, with announcements last year of Starcraft finally getting a true sequel, whispers once again started to stir of Diablo’s resurrection. Thankfully, fruit has been borne of those desires.

The launched site features a surprising amount of eye-candy in terms of media and visual accounts of actual gameplay. Two classes have been released thus far on the site: the return of the Barbarian-class from Diablo 2, as well as a Witch Doctor-class that no doubt will be replacing the Necromancer from the previous game. New and old monster classes have been released in small doses as well, and no doubt additional character and monster classes will be revealed as time goes on.

Check out the site here – Official Diablo III Site

No announcements on a projected release date for the game have been given, though speculation suggests that it will be either before or after Starcraft 2, to give the respective giants their space.

Read more at The Daily Page: Going old school at the 2008 Midwest Gaming Classic

See also
midwestgamingclassic.com
www.twingalaxies.com

A While after Age of Empires II, Ensemble game studios went to work on another RTS. Although it has similar gameplay mechanics to Age of Empires, it’s a different experience. For one, there are are only three civilizations as compared to the many civilizations from Age of Empires. Players can choose between the Greeks, the Norse, and the Egyptians. However, each civilization has it’s own set of powers, units, and structures. Each civilization has three gods, one of which you select before a match. Also, there is only one single-player campaign, although it’s huge and expansive. You follow the adventures of Atlantean general Arkantos as he attempts to regain the favor of the god Poseidon. You’ll travel through each of the three lands and meet each of the three civilizations.
[Read the rest of this entry…]

I can’t review the second entry in Mad Doc/Sierra’s RTS series without bring up comparisons to Microsoft/Big Huge Game’s Rise of Nations. Both games merge Civilization-style world building with Warcraft-style RTS gameplay, let you choose from several different civilizations, and require epoch advances and research to give you an edge. However Empire Earth II has a much steeper learning curve than Rise of Nations. In addition to managing armies and conducting diplomacy, you also map out war plans for your allies, deal with the weather, and research tech trees. Going through each of the tutorial scenarios is a must when starting a new game. Empire Earth II features a new picture-in-picture interface which allows you to set bookmarks and view the action from afar. You can even direct units and production. The citizen manager allows you to manage idle citizens and assign them to various tasks, such as gathering a certain resource. These new features are complicated to use, but mastering them will make it easier to coordinate the action. The game includes three campaigns: the Koreans, the Americans, and the Germans. There are also several campaigns known as ‘turning points’ which recreate key points in history such as China’s Three Kingdoms era and the World War 2 Normandy Invasion. Also part of the package is the Art of Supremacy expansion pack. It features new civilizations, campaigns, and a campaign maker. It wasn’t well received as the main game when it was released on its own, but as part of the package, it’s a pretty good value. For fans of Age of Empires who want something even deeper, Empire Earth II will reward patient players with a solid RTS experience.